


Home Is Where The Heart Is

by celynBrum (Celyn_Brum)



Series: Alternian Nation [1]
Category: Alien Nation, Homestuck
Genre: Adoption, Adorable Moirallegiance, Alternate Universe - No Sburb Session, Alternian Nation, Culture Shock, Multi, Murder Mystery, Other, Pale Romance | Moirallegiance, Serial Killer, Trolls on Earth
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-03-29
Updated: 2012-06-02
Packaged: 2017-11-02 16:50:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 24
Words: 128,977
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/371230
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Celyn_Brum/pseuds/celynBrum
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"An immense saucer descending from the clouds and impacting the ground, as the press and through them the people of Earth looked on in shock and awe. That was the scene in California's Mohave desert two years ago today: the historic first view of the Alternian ship upon its dramatic arrival. Their ship was a refugee ship carrying a quarter million children and young adults ready to settle in almost any environment, but they washed ashore on Earth with no way to get back to where they came from. Civil liberties attorneys successfully lobbied for the Alternians' release from quarantine and in the last two years, the Alternians have become the latest addition to the population of Los Angeles."</p>
<p>The representitives of a race of newcomers fight to give their people a home on Earth- but even without the deadly killer stalking the streets of LA, just surviving is hard enough for some. Can humans and aliens work together to build a better future? Or is it all doomed to end in bloodshed?</p>
<p>One thing is for sure - for sixteen teenagers, this is going to be a dangerous week.<br/>___<br/><em>You don't have to know Alien Nation at all to read, understand or enjoy this fic!</em></p>
            </blockquote>





	1. ==> Be The Psychotic Serial Killer

### PROLOGUE ==> Be The Psychotic Serial Killer

Even at night, the city was too bright. Fake acidic neon light polluted the purity of the darkness with its corrupting corona, destroying the soothing serenity of the night-time shroud. He hissed in anger at the betrayal and spread his fingers across his face in a futile attempt to keep the lurid light from sinking into his skin. Beside him, the crisp candy colors of an LCD television reached out from behind the thick glass and solidly barred window of a cheap electronics store. It showed an immense saucer descending from the clouds, its impact with the ground recorded on a dozen different shaky camera phones, crowds of people representing the human race pointing and watching in shock and awe. The sound of the voice-over was just audible from the street, the presenter delivering his lines in an solemnly theatrical fashion- presumably appropriate to the gravity of the documentary.

_“That was the scene in California's Mojave desert two years ago today: the historic first view of the Alternian ship upon its dramatic arrival. Their ship was a refugee ship carrying two hundred and fifty thousand children and young adults ready to settle in almost any environment, but they washed ashore on Earth with no way to get back to where they came from. Civil liberties attorneys successfully lobbied for the Alternians' release from Quarantine and in the last two years, the Alternians have become the latest addition to the population of Los Angeles.”_

A low moan bubbled out of his throat and he stumbled away from the greedy glow that tried to snatch him up. A few passers-by gave him passing glances. Maybe they thought he was drunk; maybe they were already subtle servants of evil. To get away from their judgments and their thoughts and the terrible burning light he stumbled into an alley. It should have been dark but sickening sodium orange suffused the air here and he sank to the ground with a muffled sob, trying not to breathe it in. He was surrounded. Outnumbered. The whole city was poison, but he couldn't leave; not until his quest was at an end.

A silhouette crossed the mouth of the alley, a shadow with horns and claws and something clutched close to its chest. He raised his head to stare at the newcomer, who stumbled forwards without even noticing him until it nearly tripped over. Slowly it crouched, bringing itself to eye level; in the omnipresent orange light it was hard to see what color irises it had but he knew that its blood would be the same bright, disgusting color.

“Yo, man,” it murmured blearily. “The... the fuck? You, you okay?”

He looked at the bottle in its hands, unlabeled and wrapped in brown paper. From a distance he could have mistaken it for sour milk, cheap to obtain and an effective drug for an unearthly creature, but it wasn't anything so innocent. He didn't even need to see the color to know because he could smell the sopor and he felt his anger rising. This creature had filthy blood, foul blood, and it was full of the stinking slime. It was a cursed creature, a creation of the colors, a harbinger of lies and deceit. His hand slipped inside his shirt and grasped the rough hilt of his long knife, a sacred sword that could cut down any foe. His eyes flicked over the creature's shoulder, to check for any witnesses. He saw none.

Dulled and docile as its sopor-sapped wits were, it was still a troll, and it saw the danger coming. In a flash it was diving to one side in a panicked attempt to abscond from the alley. It was far, far faster than it had any right to be, but he was faster still. His blade flashed and suddenly it only had one working leg; in the second it took for it to realize that, he was on top of it with the blade at its throat. It stared up at him with wide eyes- maybe maroon, jade, cerulean- and shook with terror. Was it about to cry out? He couldn't have that.

“Shoosh,” he whispered softly, and it whimpered, dark tears spilling out of its eyes. A wide, feral grin split his face as he grabbed it by its filthy collar and half dragged, half led it deeper into the dark, welcoming shadows. It kept crying, limping behind him with one useless leg, and he felt his blood singing at the knowledge of what was to come. Once again he had the means to show them the truth, to make them fear, to prove that he was not to be cast aside and forgotten. He roughly dropped the creature and held it down with a careless knee as he considered what to do. It struggled weakly, no match for his superior strength, and it begged. It called him by the name they had given him, the one that was printed in the papers, and he knew that it already knew its fate. If it had shouted for help, it might have had a chance, but it had been too afraid. It was a coward and an addict and a fool, and it wasn't worth his time to draw this out further.

He finished it with a single swipe of the blade and set to work on the already cooling body. It didn't matter what color the blood was, only that it was easy to bury his arms in the corpse and coat his fingers and smear the hot fluid into crisp, bright shapes. A greater power spoke through him, freezing and flaming in his chest and writing a clear message across the walls for the traitors and blind men who would find it. Perhaps this time they would listen to his message. Perhaps this time they would give back what they had stolen from him.

His efforts were interrupted by a clattering sound from behind him, and he turned to see a stranger backing away from the gory scene. From the smell alone he could tell the stranger was homeless, and the human looked almost as wasted as the troll had been, but a witness is a witness and this one had seen too much. In a few steps he had caught up to the man, and he didn't waste time or take risks. The blade silenced him before he had time to scream. He took the opportunity to crouch and take the small amount of cash that both the human and the troll had been carrying. It was wrong to steal, of course, and he felt terrible- but he had a higher calling and sometimes that required a little flexibility in such matters.

For a moment he thought he felt other eyes watching him, and he glanced about- but the only company he had were his two new victims. Bright red blood, black in the sodium light, pooled into whatever color the troll had possessed. He stood there staring at it for a long while, before realizing what it meant. This was a sign, a gift: he was getting close to his goal, and he had been blessed with a new message, a new medium. Joy filled him as he bent down to collect the new shade, smearing it across the walls to add to his artwork. He had so much work left to do. In truth it was hard, being alone on such an important mission, with such fearsome foes arrayed against him.

It was hard, and no-one understood.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello!
> 
> This is my first fanfiction, using as many characters from Homestuck as I could remember/wedge in, with Trolls dumped unceremoniously to replace the Tenctonese in a (slightly modified) Alien Nation setting. I am also using Alien Nation characters later - to clarify before the point, they are ALL HUMAN! Two alien races would be a bit of a mess.
> 
> If you don't know either Homestuck or Alien Nation, go find 'em and check them out. Homestuck is a web- comic? story? thing?- which defies explanation by being a big ball of timey-wimey stuff. Alien Nation is a film followed by a single TV series from the early 90s in which the usual buddy-cop/detective story happens to have one of the cop buddies be an alien. Both are awesome.
> 
> That is all.


	2. ==> Be The Angry Adolescent Fuckup

### CHAPTER ONE ==> Be The Angry Adolescent Fuckup

Karkat Vantas was really starting to dislike being pitied. If there had been some way to tell his past self that- some sort of shitty time travel paradox memo board musclebeast shit or something- he was pretty sure that Past Karkat would have responded with a veritable torrent of eloquent but unwarranted abuse. He would have pointed out at length Present Karkat's glaring deficiencies in intellect, social skills, common sense and basic fucking gratitude. This would have been partly because Past Karkat was an opinionated, arrogant, ignorant little shit without any fucking clue what Present Karkat was going through, but also because past or present, Karkat was a hopeless romantic.

Growing up on Alternia he had secretly dreamed of having someone to pity or hate him. Someone who would look after him or someone who would respect him, but mostly just someone who would actually give a flying fuck either way. He'd thought that maybe that could happen one day- that if he really tried, he could make himself important enough or badass enough that being a mutant-blooded freak somehow wouldn't matter any more. Okay, so he'd have to get over how incurably infuriating the entire rest of the universe was, but sometimes when he watched enough sappy romance films he could actually forget that he was destined to die young, alone and uncared for on the wrong end of a culling fork. Then there would be another close call with a sharp edge or some dumbfuck neighbor of his would piss off the wrong highblood and he'd get another graphic reminder that he could never, ever afford to let another person get that close.

The night everything changed, he'd been talking to Sollux on Trollian, which actually meant arguing with Sollux on Trollian until his asshole hacker friend made Karkat's computer explode again. He'd ended up riffing off something Sollux said and going into a whole spiel about the levels to which his life sucked, and the even more infinite depths of suckiness achieved by Alternia as a whole, and and how it was fucking typical that of all the awful shitty places in the universe, Past Karkat had contrived to be hatched in the most awful and shittiest of them all. Rant done, he'd sat there for maybe five minutes waiting for Sollux to reply. He'd been expecting some equally verbose and heated response, but in the end when the yellow text appeared there was only one lone sentence.

TA: what iif you could be 2omewhere el2e?

Karkat was pretty sure that he wanted to kill Sollux right then. Unfortunately the Mother Grub had failed to fuck him over with any ludicrous psionic powers, and since his own ability to make the computers of fuckwads explode was mortifyingly unreliable he went for an epic verbal flaming instead.

CG: THAT'S NOT FUCKING FUNNY, CAPTOR. THAT IS IN FACT THE WORST FUCKING JOKE IN THE HISTORY OF ALL HUMOR.  
CG: WHEN THEY WRITE THE COMPLETE HISTORY OF THE UNIVERSE THEY ARE GOING TO INCLUDE WHAT YOU JUST SAID AS THE PRIME FUCKING EXAMPLE FROM ALL OF TIME AND SPACE OF NOT FUCKING FUNNY.  
CG: PEOPLE WILL MEMORISE YOUR WORDS AND USE THEM TO STOP STUPID HYSTERICAL SHITHEADS FROM LAUGHING THEMSELVES TO DEATH, THAT IS HOW UNFUNNY YOU ARE.  
CG: DO YOU REALLY THINK THAT I WOULD BE ON ALTERNIA IF THERE WAS SOMEWHERE ELSE I COULD BE, YOU NOOKSNIFFING IDIOT?  
CG: LET ME ANSWER THAT, SINCE YOU ARE CLEARLY TOO STUPID TO EVER WORK IT OUT UNLESS I TELL YOU EXPLICITLY: NO. NO I WOULD NOT.  
CG: I HATE THIS PLANET AND EVERYONE ON IT MORE THAN I HATE THE ENTIRE REST OF THE UNIVERSE.  
CG: YOU AND ME BEING INCLUDED IN THAT LATTER CATEGORY, BULGEMUNCH.

There had been another long pause which Karkat had spent stewing in vindicated bitterness before Sollux's response.

TA: iit2 not a joke kk, ii ju2t had two know iif you were 2eriious  
TA: ii know how you can get off alterniia  
TA: but you have two 2wear not two tell anyone.

Hands shaking and digestive sac fluttering with hope, Karkat had sworn, and Sollux had told him about the ship. It was a mad plan, a crazy and desperate plan, but it was also the only chance Karkat would ever get to escape the hemospectrum hoofbeast shit and the Imperial culling drones and maybe, _maybe_ have a shot at a fucking life. He had said yes and after a few long perigees of silence on the matter he'd got a message that was nothing more than a set of geographic coordinates. He'd picked up the bag that had been packed since Sollux told him the plan and hadn't even looked backwards as he left his hive and his crab monster lusus- because there was no room for lusii on the ship, and he hadn't cried AT ALL over that parting so fuck anyone who says he did.

He'd gone to the coordinates to wait nervously with a bunch of other scared kids- not even a fucking chance that he had looked that small and terrified- some of whom were silent and some of whom chattered nervously and all of whom were willing to risk everything just to get the fuck out. The shuttle had arrived right before dawn, just as they were all starting to get really antsy, and it had looked so old and rickety that four-and-a-half sweep old Karkat had almost had second thoughts. But he'd got aboard anyway and the doors had closed behind him, and after a brief flight that consisted of far too much rattling and clattering and cursing for comfort he had looked out of the small round window to see a sky full of stars, and hanging against them the dark bulk of the spaceship that Sollux had somehow helped to steal.

The shuttle had docked and they'd moved from one dull gray interior to another, this one packed with even more young trolls. The place was loud, full of people yelling in excitement and panic and anger and occasionally fear and pain because that was what happened when you put that many tense kids in a confined place and left them to it. Karkat had seen some trolls who had to be nearly adults and others who couldn't have been more than a couple of sweeps old before he had found a dark corner and a thin metal bench and sat down, shoulder to shoulder with anonymous strangers, holding on to the seat grille for grim life. He waited for what felt like a full season but was most likely only a few hours, wondering when the ship would get found and attacked or boarded, or whether the whole thing would just turn out to be an elaborate trap, until a young woman's voice crackled over the ship's intercom. It had to be the Heiress; Sollux had told him about her and how the whole ship-stealing thing was her idea. She sounded nice- too nice for a seadweller and far too nice to be the descendant of Her Imperious Condescension- as she told them that everyone was aboard and they were leaving Alternia. A few more tense hours followed before her voice echoed again through the cramped corridors and catwalks to let them know the impossible news; they had made it away from their home world, and nobody was following them.

In the perigees that followed Karkat grew used to life onboard, but he never truly grew to like it. How could he when everyone was rammed in like tinfish, and everything was rationed, and he never saw his best friend because Sollux had to spend every waking moment flying the ship? The voice of the Heiress came over the intercom every day like an old friend, as did another voice belonging to her friend, a girl they called the Mediator for her skill in calming disputes, but as comforting as they were there was still an edge of uncertainty and fear in their words. They were all young, the oldest person on the ship still a child when they left, and despite their preparations the only way to properly escape the grasp of the Condesce and the Empire was to run so far and so fast that nobody, not even they themselves, had any fucking clue where they were headed. Everyone knew they were probably going to die in space when the food ran out, but nobody said it. They all kept pretending it would be okay and Karkat had pretended too, because that was just how you survived through the endless days of waiting. He refused to get involved in the stupid power plays and territorial hoofbeast shit that everyone around him seemed determined to throw themselves into like the bleat-brained fuckwads they were. Keeping his head down and just surviving was hard enough as it was without deliberately looking for trouble.

The one thing that made the whole clusterfuck of a situation even remotely bearable was Gamzee Makara. Karkat had met him in the first few days on board and at first he'd had to hold himself back from throttling the fuckass. Gamzee was a tall, bony indigo-blood who wore white clown paint, who smiled all the time and hugged people from behind without their prior knowledge or consent and went on and on about “motherfucking miracles”. But when Karkat's bright red blood, secret for sweeps on lonely Alternia, was violently and publicly revealed in the crowded press of the ration line Gamzee was there to pull people off his “little mutant bro” and remind them that all that shit got left light-years behind, and most every motherfucker on the boat got some dark reason to be there. So even though he sometimes wanted to choke Makara on his own shitty soda pop bottles Karkat didn't, because fuck knows he was short enough on people to watch his back.

Karkat had started hanging out with Gamzee and his friends; the weird cat-girl roleplayer who was actually kind of sweet- although there was no fucking way he'd ever tell her that- and her moirail, the creepy-ass blue-blood who didn't seem to have any reason at all for being on the nookstain of a ship unless you counted pissing off Karkat every single fucking day. He had learned that Gamzee had spent so much time rotting his thinkpan with a sopor pie addiction that, in his own words; “motherfucking drones weren't all even gonna be waiting to hear about the motherfucking miracles before they were all up and culling me”. Karkat should have been furious that someone who'd been born with everything he'd always lacked could have managed to fuck it all up so spectacularly, and furious he was, but he also knew that Gamzee had been neglected and abandoned by his own lusus. Shitty as his own life had been, Karkat had at least had his crabby custodian to care for him; Gamzee hadn't had anyone, and that knowledge made the dumbass rotpanned highblood so fucking pitiful that Karkat fell head-over-heels pale for him. He left it unrequited because he figured there was no chance it was mutual. Gamzee liked everyone but didn't seem to have any room in his head for pity, or hate, or anything other than a sort of perpetual aimless bliss.

Then somewhere between Karkat's fifth and sixth wriggling days the sopor finally ran out, and he learned that his pale crush had been one slime pie away from flipping the fuck out the entire time. Not that he was the only one- deprived of sopor enhanced sleep, half the highbloods on the ship went shithive maggots at once, and a whole bunch of the more cull-happy lowbloods decided to join in for shits and giggles, and suddenly Karkat's crapsack life looked like a bed of fucking candy roses compared to the horror movie that had taken over the dull gray corridors and rooms. Rainbow blood painted the walls, dismembered limbs hung from pipes, and somehow Karkat managed to dodge getting murdered by psychotic assholes long enough to run into his indigo friend while looking for a half-decent hiding spot. He saw a honking clown-faced demon surrounded by bodies and dripping with blood and instead of running the fuck away or fighting for his life Karkat instead went temporarily insane and hugged the crazy troll because he could see Gamzee, his beautiful happy Gamzee, looking out from behind the monster's eyes.

Karkat hadn't actually wanted to die a horrible and painful death, so the fact that it worked was a huge relief. It wasn't until later, when the Mediator and the ship's small crew had managed to organize some sort of gas to knock the rampaging lunatics out, and the survivors were starting to poke their heads out and think about maybe cleaning the place up, that they had talked about what it might mean. Gamzee had clung to him like a fucking limpet and told him how pitiful it was that Karkat had spent his whole life being alone just because his blood was a beautiful miracle color, and how it made his heart ache to watch Karkat yelling at people who just wouldn't motherfucking listen when he obviously gave such fucking bitchtits advice, and after that they'd basically spent the remainder of the journey sticking to each other like they just invented moirallegiance and had the exclusive rights to it.

The end of the exodus, when it came, was abrupt. An announcement from the Heiress about an inhabited world nearby, a more panicked announcement from the Mediator about some problems with the ship, a very brief and rough ride which Karkat had pretty much assumed was going to fucking kill them all, and then they were down on a planet with their only means of escape scattered across several miles of the local countryside. They'd all been on edge and ready to defend themselves when the locals showed up, but the Mediator had held them back. How the Heiress had possessed the nerve to step out there in front of the natives alone and unarmed and with Sollux still unconscious Karkat would never know, but it had been enough. Enough to convince the strange troll-like aliens- the humans, hornless and stocky and all shades of brown instead of gray- to help them instead of culling them. Enough to get several truckloads of food brought out for them, and for the armed men to be replaced by men in gray suits, and for the Heiress and the Mediator and eventually even Sollux to spend some time around the excitable humans with TV cameras.

For Karkat, the main thing he remembered about the arrival was the sky. He'd become so used to gray metal walls around everything that he just lay on his back and stared up at the stars, which he'd never seen for as long as he'd been traveling past them. Beside him Gamzee breathed deeply and muttered happily to himself, leaving to chase bugs and bring his tiny iridescent captives back for Karkat to admire. They ate fresh food and drank unrecycled water and realized that for the first time in their lives they had everything to live for.

After that there had been Quarantine and the INS and the sky had vanished again, this time in favor of white cloth and flimsy plastic tents that did nothing to block the daytime light. It wasn't as bad as it first seemed, because the sun here was much dimmer than the Alternian star and the days weren't too much brighter than the twin moonlit nights Karkat was used to. Given the sleep patterns of the aliens that now controlled their destiny, pretty much all of the trolls had managed to become diurnal somewhere in the middle of the rounds of immigration interviews and interrogations and being poked and prodded with cold metal implements. Things had started to get complicated again when the humans officially decided they could stay. That alone sounded utterly fucking ridiculous to Karkat. Their spaceship was scrap metal, impossible to repair, their Helmsman was refusing to do anything even close to flying again, and the humans had literally no way to get rid of them except killing them all which they'd already sworn blind they had no intention of doing. How exactly was letting them stay even a fucking decision? But apparently it was, because after that announcement the CPS showed up.

The humans refused to let most of them just look after themselves, despite the fact that they evidently could. Given the greater autonomy of young trolls and the sheer number of of them on the ship they did agree that every troll over the age of seven and a half sweeps- or sixteen in human years- at the time of the crash would be granted emancipated minor status, but Karkat and Gamzee didn't meet that criteria. Neither did the Heiress, the Mediator or Sollux for that matter, but it seemed that powerful and influential humans were queuing around the block to “adopt” the leaders of the Alternian newcomers. For the rest of them, there was a crash course in living on Earth followed by hurried “placements”. From what Karkat understood of the whole process, humans generally raised their own offspring- which raised a whole host of questions he never did get answers to- but if that was for some reason impossible they tried to find a new “parent” in a manner similar to a lusus choosing a grub to raise. However, rather than just letting the unchosen wigglers die, they would pay other human adults to care for them, theoretically temporarily. Their response to a massive influx of nonhuman children into this system was apparently to offer a higher fee to anyone willing to play lusus. It seemed they also expected some of the older, emancipated trolls to adopt younger ones, but those hopes were very quickly dashed. A few rare cases had a red quadrant they were willing to care for, but when the humans realized what “matesprit” meant they did a complete collective acrobatic backflip off the handle which took a good few weeks to get ironed out to everyone's persistent but tolerable dissatisfaction.

Luckily for Karkat and Gamzee, the fallout from that particular clusterfuck had included a very thorough run-down for the humans on all of the romantic quadrants and their socio-cultural purposes for trolls. Karkat had been shocked to learn that their new host species had only one solitary romantic bond, but to his never-ending relief they had at least grasped the importance of conciliatory relationships and had gone out of their way to place moirails and auspistices together. Not that they seemed to really understand even after all that; at the end of their moirallegiance assessments, after what must have been a couple of seasons in Quarantine, a very serious woman in a very neat suit had taken Karkat aside and given him some pills and a slip of paper and a very extensive and labored explanation of Gamzee's new medication regimen and how it was Karkat's job to make sure he stuck to it. He had nodded politely then wondered vocally and at length exactly what kind of a shitty moirail they thought he was that he needed to be ordered to help his pale quadrant. The woman hadn't been happy but she had made a note in both files, and wherever the pair got moved to after that they were moved together.

For the first couple of months- the new human calendar became more natural with use, although Karkat never admitted it aloud- there were a lot of crowded houses and strange humans and very little stability. Then Karkat and Gamzee got a more permanent foster placement, one with just the two of them, and learned that for all their fuss about child safety and protecting minors humans make shitty lusii. Or perhaps it was just their foster parent, an obese human male that Karkat refused to refer to as anything other than “the Asshole”. Occasionally he was “sir,” but only on nights where the bruises hadn't healed up enough or Gamzee looked like he was about to fucking snap. Karkat always tried to protect Gamzee, because of the two of them he was much, much better at taking shit. Especially since That Asshole started taking the money that was _supposed_ to be for Gamzee's meds and spending it on who-knows-what. Oh, wait, Karkat did know- it was cheap, crappy beer, not a fucking hard guess seeing as how that was where all the fucking money went. Anyway, it was better that Karkat pissed the Asshole off than chance Gamzee drawing attention, because that could end up with honks and mirthful messiahs and murdervoodoo up the walls and Karkat had promised his moirail that wouldn't happen again, not ever. The clown-faced idiot had enough trouble handling what was happening as it was; after what Gamzee had done on the ship, the last thing they needed to do was start making trouble, so Karkat just dealt with it and kept quiet.

It was all just barely holding together until one day in a fit of inexplicable caretaking emotion the Asshole decided to drive them home from school instead of letting them stroll back through the local hellhole as usual. Karkat had actually kind of liked human school, especially since theirs had plenty of trolls in it so he wasn't alone in not knowing how most of the stupid human shit around them worked. It was nice to get out of the house, nice to learn things about this new planet, nice to be doing things with an aim beyond “don't get culled today” or “forget about imminent threat of culling”. Gamzee had been enjoying it too, although for different reasons, and it was the worst kind of luck that the Asshole had arrived just in time to see the indigo-blood sharing an almost embarrassingly endearing kiss with his flush-crush.

The shitstorm hadn't started until they got back to the house, but Karkat had smelled it coming and spent the whole journey in a state of nervous tension. Even so he hadn't been ready for the magnitude of the Asshole's explosion. It took him at least five minutes of confused listening to even understand what Gamzee was being yelled at for, and when he realized what the word “fag” was supposed to mean Karkat felt something inside him go snap. No. Just no. That was not a thing. You do not fucking yell at someone because they might have just found their fucking matesprit. They should have been fucking celebrating how this was a wonderful, beautiful, happy thing and instead the Asshole was screaming at Gamzee. Gamzee, who Karkat could see was shaking in a way that could be fright or could be about to rip limbs off. Did this fucking nookstain even realize how much danger he was in? Then Karkat realized that he really didn't, because there was no way he would steal Gamzee's medicine money if he did. He just didn't give even the smallest shit about them, either of them, and at that realization Karkat's blood started to boil. Then the Asshole started to clench his fists in a way that was far, far too familiar, except this time he was looking at Gamzee, not Karkat, and the little part of him that had snapped rained down in a thousand broken pieces that reflected nothing but pure fury.

That was when Karkat had grabbed the nearest heavy object- which turned out to be the toaster- and brought it down as hard as he could on the Asshole's head. The man had fallen to the ground like someone had cut his strings, and Karkat hadn't stopped to see if he was unconscious or dead. He had just grabbed Gamzee's hand and pulled him out of the door, running down the street and away from what had just happened with his blood pusher pounding in his chest like it was about to explode.

_Fuckfuckfuckfuckfuck._

One of the first things he had learned on Earth was that humans really, really didn't like it if you tried to kill people and they liked it even less if you were successful. There had been a tight feeling in his stomach as he ran, which Karkat now knew was the feeling of his future- the whole beautiful glittering future that he'd somehow managed to stumble onto, the future that had been lying out in front of him unmapped and so full of possibilities, the future that he and Gamzee had shared laughter for when they realized they had it- burning and dying like the mutilated waste of dreams and hopes it had always been, because Karkat was a useless mutant-blooded piece of cullbait who turned everything he touched into shit, usually through his own mindless stupidity or fucking asshole rages. Well, fuck it. Karkat didn't need that sappy shit anyway. He'd got them into this mess and now he would figure out how he and his moirail were going to survive on this dumbass world with no place left to go and nobody left to help them.

In the end surviving without drawing attention had proven to be both depressingly easy and agonizingly difficult. As it turned out, troll temperaments were not best suited to the human foster system, and Karkat and Gamzee were far from the first or the last of their kind to make an unofficial exit from it. The streets were littered with the failures of multispecies child-rearing and nobody noticed two more homeless kids with horns. Not that there weren't new things to learn; troll instincts might have been pretty good for survival in general, but sleeping rough in human cities had its own traps and pitfalls to navigate. They had spent a week or two living precariously on intermittent, infrequent thefts, both constantly afraid of getting caught and arrested with one or both of them wanted for assault or murder. Then Gamzee had worked out how to avoid the whole risky issue. He had been watching the humans around them in similar situations and as soon as he realized what they were doing he had brought the idea to Karkat.

They had discussed it at length a couple of times, because neither of them was really sure how looking weak and helpless around crowds of people could possibly be a good thing. Then they had become desperate enough to actually try it and the humans had responded, just giving them money and food for sitting there with their very best “cull-me-now” faces on. The first time a cop had come over to tell them to move on Karkat had nearly died of panic, but that was the most attention the law ever paid to them, and although they weren't exactly well-fed the results were better than their incompetent, sporadic thievery had been. They never made enough money to get Gamzee his meds either, but sometimes there would be a good day and they could scrape together enough to buy some sopor from a shifty human who was even better at absconding from the first hint of cops than Karkat was. The shit he sold was no-holds-barred illegal, but nobody seemed to care about his buyers and Gamzee swore that eating the foul green slime helped him to feel better, so Karkat figured it was worth the risk.

The only problem was that after weeks of sitting there asking random humans for spare change, he was starting to get sick of the look on their faces. Only one look, for all of them, and although it was pity it wasn't the sort he'd fantasized about back on Alternia or the sort he shared with Gamzee. This human pity was blank, impersonal, uncaring, more like disgust than any kind of romantic emotion and it made Karkat furious because every time he saw it he felt a little bit less like a person. It made him want to jump up and grab people and scream in their faces that he fucking well had feelings, he had thoughts, he was just like them and they were fucking assholes who knew nothing at all about him so how dare they fucking judge him like that. Every time he thought about it and then did nothing except hate himself a little bit more. Fuck humans and fuck their pity. He hated them so much it was almost blackrom. Black for a whole planet and its entire shitty population, that was Karkat fucking Vantas.

Well, maybe not the _entire_ population, because he could see Gamzee strolling into view around the corner like he didn't have a care in the world, his face still strange and bare without the thick white clown make-up that should have covered it. The tall troll waved cheerfully to Karkat, who was curled up in a defensive ball at the edge of the sidewalk. Karkat glowered and waited until his moirail was within grabbing distance before yanking him down onto the grubby blanket and flattened cardboard that was serving as a seat and shoving his face inches from Gamzee's own. At this distance he had a really good view of the purple-flecked eyes and the three thin scars that crossed his moirail's face, narrowly missing Gamzee's right eye.

“Where the everloving fuck have you been?” he snarled in their native Alternian, choking every bit of worry and fear he'd been feeling since the night before into his voice. “Do you have even the faintest glimmering of a clue what I have been through, you inconsiderate fucking jackass? Did you not think that maybe, just maybe, you might want to tell your grubdamned moirail before you abandon him on his own in the middle of the fucking night to go skipping off to whatever magic moron factory you've decided to search for this week? Did you not think maybe I should get some fucking warning before you paint the jumbo-sized easy victim sign on both of us or were you too busy being a complete bulgemunching rotpanned shit-eating asshole?”

Gamzee responded by grinning and pulling a handful of banknotes out of a shabby coat pocket. “I was all up and earning us some motherfucking cash, palebro,” he explained eagerly. Karkat stared at the wad of money- which was mostly ones, but still came to more than he'd been expecting to make that day- then snatched it out of Gamzee's hands before the other troll did something stupid like try to eat it.

“I didn't even fucking know if you were alive,” he muttered, feeling tears prick at the corners of his eyes. Gamzee's face immediately fell in contrition, and Karkat felt his moirail's bony arms wrap around him and tug him into a close, warm hug.

“Aww, I'm motherfucking sorry, bro,” Gamzee said. “But this shit was all like a one-time last-minute deal. I wasn't all up and expecting it to take so motherfucking long, and there ain't no way I'd be all leaving you alone all this time on purpose.”

Karkat shifted into a less spine-twisting position and burrowed further into Gamzee, burying his face in the taller troll's chest and trying to ignore the way his cheeks and neck were flaring with embarrassment at what was unavoidably a public display of affection. Gamzee returned the gesture by tenderly scratching his claws across Karkat's scalp and ruffling his hair. It felt so nice that Karkat forgot to worry about potential onlookers and closed his eyes.

“Where the fuck do you even go off to?” he asked, voice muffled by the layers of bright clothing Gamzee had found to wrap himself in. He'd been wearing them all long enough that they smelled of him. Actually they stank of him, not to mention sopor slime and weirdly a hint of cheap soap, but Karkat didn't give a fuck because to him Gamzee smelled like safety and comfort and he wanted to breathe that in and never ever stop. There was a long pause without a response, and reluctantly Karkat opened his eyes and raised his head to glare balefully at his moirail.

“You do not get to be fucking secretive about this. Not this time,” he said, some of the edge creeping back into his words. Gamzee sighed and looked away from his gaze and Karkat pulled back even further, breaking out of the hug altogether as his blood pusher chilled with thoughts of what his pale quadrant could have been doing.

“Gamzee...” he began. The other troll shook his head violently.

“Don't motherfucking ask me,” he said. “Just... don't. Please. If you ask then I'll all up and tell you and you won't fucking like it and you'll get wound up and be all getting your yell on and I don't... I can't do that shit now, so please.”

Karkat stared at his moirail, then leaned back over into the hug, this time keeping an eye on the bustling street. “Okay,” he said, as calmly as he could manage. “Alright. What the fuck do you want to talk about?”

Gamzee stroked Karkat's hair gently with one hand, carefully avoiding the hornbeds. “Nothing,” he said. “This motherfucker just wants to spend a little time chilling with his best bro. But later it would be a motherfucking miracle if we could have us a bitchtits wicked feelings jam.”

Karkat closed his eyes tight again as he breathed in warmth and protection and proper caring pity. “Of course we can have a fucking feelings jam, you stupid wiggler. In fact, you know what? If you have not come to me about this by the end of the week, I am going to physically hold you down and papshoosh you until you confess all of your deepest and, mothergrub help me, darkest secrets. That's including the truly disturbing clown-religion ones that I just know you are fucking hiding from me even though we both know that I never, ever, ever want to see them brought to light. You understand, you nookwhiff? I am going to break every last bit of functioning spongematter in my thinkpan on the deepest recesses of your twisted psyche unless you are honest with me.”

“Shoosh,” Gamzee said, continuing to ruffle Karkat's hair. “I'll all up and motherfucking tell you. Just... not now.”

Karkat's opened a scowling red eye and glared at the rush hour crowds. “Assholes,” he muttered absently, the change of subject his unspoken assent to Gamzee's conditions. His moirail smiled and followed his gaze.

“You're the best motherfucking miracle ever happened to me,” he said quietly, and Karkat stiffened. He knew precisely what Gamzee would say next because he'd said it before, this exact same speech, but he stayed quiet anyway and let the bony troll speak because some things are worth hearing every time.

“You're always there,” Gamzee said, lowering his head to rest on top of Karkat's. “Like, even when I'm so far off the motherfucking deep end I'm not even me, you're there. And any time I feel like shit's getting too hard, or too bad, or I just can't handle what's in my thinkpan, you're right fucking there. So I don't care about anything else, so long as I got you and me together.”

Karkat sniffled and tried to wipe his face on Gamzee's shoulder, leaving a pale red smear across the cloth. He pulled his face back a little and glanced up at his moirail.

“So you're not going to fucking wander off in the middle of the fucking night any more?” he growled. Gamzee grinned, showing far too many teeth.

“Nah, palebro, that ain't quite a promise I'm making,” he said. “But... I do promise that I'll always motherfucking come back. And if my fucking moirail ever up and needs me, I am right the fuck here. Always and forever.”

Karkat sighed and took in a deep breath of Gamzee. “Always and forever,” he echoed. “Fuck.” Pulling away from his moirail, he wiped a grubby sleeve across his face to clean off what could not possibly be tears because then he would have been blubbing like a useless wiggler, which was not the case. “How do I look?”

“Motherfucking miraculous,” Gamzee replied, idly brushing an errant red tear track with his thumb. Karkat angrily scrubbed at his face again before settling his back to the wall and glaring back out at the crowds, daring them to come over and pity him. He jerked bolt upright as he caught sight of another familiar figure picking his way through the crowds.

“Fuck,” he hissed. Gamzee leaned forward to see where he was looking and broke into an easy grin at the sight. Karkat, realizing what they were doing, stopped staring and tried to pull his moirail back. He was too late; the object of their attention saw them looking and swaggered over. He was, like them, about seven sweeps old; he wore black jeans, a red shirt and aviator sunglasses, strawberry blond hair just barely ruffling in the breeze, and he had three large pizza boxes balanced on one arm. Everything about him screamed “Insufferable Prick” and Karkat tensed up as he got closer, knowing from experience that the impression was one hundred percent accurate.

As he drew close, the human flicked the top box off the small stack he was carrying and held it out to Karkat with his previously spare hand. Karkat scowled up at him.

“Well, look who decided to show up and fucking ruin my day. Don't you have better places to be, you gigantic bulgemunching shitstain?”

The douchebag tilted his head slightly, sunglasses making it hard to read anything from his impassive face. “What can I say? You know how to treat a girl. As if you didn't know how I rely on your regular dose of projectile insult vomit to keep me warm at night, like a truly gross and stinky alien slime blanket.”

“Fuck you,” Karkat said viciously. “Fuck you and everyone you have ever met, including me for condescending to exist in the same reality as you. The fact that we are breathing the same noxious air makes me want to tear out my lungs and burn them and have the ashes buried in a peat bog, except I am reasonably convinced that you would somehow make a mindless fucking innuendo about it. So I will keep it pan-numbingly simple for us both and reiterate: fuck you. Now take the hint and stop polluting my already hopelessly garbage-filled waste dump of a life.”

The corners of the kid's mouth twitched. “Fuck me, huh? I knew you wanted a piece of this fine fucking ass,” he said. His voice sounded unfussed, unhurried. A little bored, perhaps. “Well, too bad, because I am already in high demand. I am more popular than Brad Pitt and Harrison Ford combined. Chicks want me like nerds want Star Trek, staying up late on the internet memorizing facts about me until they get in fights with each other about what are my best features. I got bitches throwing themselves at my feet all hours of the day and night and I have to fight them off with a fucking stick, and since I don't have a bodyguard opening for a fucking asshole alien you're just gonna have to give up your dreams of us being together, man.”

“You are, without a doubt, the most obnoxious being I have ever met in my entire shit-awful life,” Karkat spat. “And I have a wide basis for comparison, because I have met every single self-important shit-eating grubfucker to ever make their fellow lifeforms want to throttle them with their own digestive tract. It's like my fucking calling in life, to encounter every insufferable waste of food and oxygen the universe has produced so that I can judge which one is worthy of being their undisputed king, and it is you. You are the undisputed god of intolerable mouthy assholes everywhere. The only people who even fucking go near you are probably those who aspire to infuriate and enrage others. They are there to worship at your fucking feet and hope that some of your impossible hoofbeast shit overflows into their vacant thinkpans.”

The kid shrugged. “Yeah, well, like I said. Anyone can tell I've got armies of worshipers, that's a fucking given. I am godlike, yada yada yada. Do you want the fucking pizza or not, because I have places to be and important godlike shit to do. I can't let the little people down, gotta give them a taste of their divine master before they all give up and die of disappointment.” He paused and deliberately turned his head, complete with inscrutable shades, to look theatrically at the outstretched pizza box.

“What, you think we need your shitty pizza?” Karkat snapped. His belly chose that moment to gurgle softly and remind him that yes, actually, they probably did need this insufferable human prick's shitty pizza. He told it to shut the hell up because it didn't know what it was on about, but he was sure the douchebag had heard it. Fucking asshole.

“It was three for two at the pizza place,” the douchebag said, still calm and disconnected, not losing his cool for an instant. Karkat sort of had to admire his control, even if he was infuriating. “Except the third one is sushi topping, and who even eats that shit? So I figured hey, might as well give it to someone, and you're the lucky winner. Feel free to claim your prize any time, as long as ya do it before I throw this shit in the garbage.”

“You want to dump your fucking crap on us? Do we look like the fucking garbage disposal to you?” Karkat snapped. “If you didn't want fucking sushi why did you even order it? Are you a complete moron? No, don't answer that. You were obviously born with a malfunctioning think-pan, which you were not culled for because you terts are too soft-hearted to cull anything that shits and squalls. I congratulate you on being able to stand upright and breathe at the same time, since that is clearly a fucking accomplishment for you. I would offer my support in achieving your lifelong dream of not becoming a complete shitsponge but sadly, it is already too late and I don't even give a fuck.”

Karkat stopped, chest heaving for breath as he glowered at the human who stared back impassively. Their stony silence was broken only by the sound of Gamzee chuckling, and slowly they both turned to stare at their almost forgotten spectator.

“Well, shit,” the tall purple-blood said, grinning like a maniac. “You all up and want to throw away them little motherfucking fishes? That shit's gotta be a motherfucking crime.” He held an expectant hand out upwards and kept grinning. For the first time the human boy showed a clear emotion as the corners of his mouth raised in a smirk. One handed he tossed the pizza box to Gamzee, who snagged it gracefully out of the air and tucked it securely into his lap. Karkat's head turned to watch the motion and when he looked back again an instant later the kid was gone. Leaning forwards to stare back and forth along the street revealed nothing, and he started to growl softly. A chuckle from Gamzee brought him up short.

“What?” Karkat demanded. “You didn't feel like helping me out at all? What the fuck happened to forever, fuckass?”

Gamzee shrugged. “You want to eat this miracle pizza?” he asked. Karkat glanced down at the box, and ran a nervous claw over it. There was a pizza in there; he could smell it, gauge the weight of the box, but somehow without having seen it he was a little afraid that there was nothing to see.

“Yeah,” he muttered, and grinning Gamzee flicked up the lid. A small jolt of relief went through Karkat when he saw steaming hot cheese and piles of blessedly uncharred toppings. Normally he wasn't a fan of the sort of food humans went for, but damn. Fresh pizza. Gamzee held the box out to him first and waited for Karkat to pick out a slice before grabbing one for himself. Karkat burned his mouth on the cheese and nearly choked on a bit of raw fish and he took care to lick every last delicious scrap of grease off his fingers before taking a second slice. The pizza vanished as quickly as it had arrived, and when they were done Karkat and Gamzee sat back against the wall and leaned comfortably on each other. As the other troll started to hum aimlessly, Karkat realized that he was not completely miserable. Okay, so part of that was the food- actually a lot of it was the food- and the fact that his wayward moirail had come back safe and sound was helping no end. But mixed in with that was a sense of satisfaction which could only have come from his row with the insufferable human prick. It wasn't that he felt black for the guy- even if he hadn't been a fucking alien, Karkat hardly even knew him- but nonetheless he felt himself smiling like a hungry howlbeast at the thought of a rematch. He mused on it for a while, idly watching the crowds and mechanically thanking anyone who stopped to drop a coin in their salvaged paper coffee cup like it would actually fucking buy anything, before he realized exactly what was causing the warm feeling in his belly. Other than seafood-laden pizza, of course.

It was good to know that at least one person on this festering planet didn't pity him at all.


	3. ==> Be The Arrogant Texan Coolkid

### CHAPTER TWO ==> Be The Arrogant Texan Coolkid

Dave Strider opened the apartment door with all the caution that almost a decade of brotherly ambushes could install. As a result he was not caught unawares by the shower of plush-rumped smuppets that fell from above. Faster than most people could have seen he darted under the avalanche, rolling smoothly and coming to his feet in a ready stance as the last few smuppets bounced off the pile, coming to rest on the stained carpet. Dave glanced cautiously about the chaotic mess of the apartment. No attack was immediately forthcoming, so he relaxed and strolled across the living room, stowing the pizza boxes safely on the kitchen counter and depositing a handful of change beside the food. Then he turned and nearly jumped out of his skin when he found Li'l Cal dangling inches from his face. Recovering fast, he proceeded to give the ventriloquist's dummy mad props in the form of a gentle fist-bump, as dictated by Strider family tradition.

“So where's the rest of the cash at?”

Turning again Dave saw his Bro lounging in one of the counter seats, pizza carton open in his hands as he regarded the contents with interest. He didn't bother wondering how Dirk had got there so fast or without his noticing. The guy was just that awesome- it was an acknowledged fact in the Strider household, on a level with the sky being blue and the sun rising in the east. Dave considered his answer and decided that honesty was pretty much not going to cut it here. Bro wouldn't have asked if he wanted to hear the truth.

“Stole it for my drug stash fund,” he told his older brother and legal guardian. “You gonna pass the pepperoni?”

Bro plucked a slice of the pizza then tossed Dave the box. “Yeah, well, next time you're jonesin', try stealing from my wallet for a change. This is the third time in the last two weeks that the takeaway money's evaporated into the inexplicable ether of your suspiciously ironic bullshit.”

Dave snagged food and chucked the box back like a Frisbee. “Can't do it man. I'm too strung out. It's steal the spare change or go sell spam porpoise to perverts time.”

“Not my problem, li'l dude,” Bro told him, grabbing another slice and getting to his feet. “But you gettin' complacent and predictable? That is. Can't have you pickin' up bad habits, can I?” With that he was gone, Li'l Cal following a moment later in a rush of cool air. Dave said nothing but mentally sighed, grabbing the open pizza box and retreating to his bedroom. Now he was going to have to be on edge all afternoon, waiting for a strife that Bro might drop on him at any second. Fuck, he probably should have been more careful about the money, but he really hadn't thought that Bro would notice. Or care.

It was a pretty safe bet that if Child Services knew about the smuppets and the constant sparring with shitty but undeniably sharp swords, they would flip the fuck out and take Dave away. In fact, Dave was fairly sure that this was the exact reason Bro had uprooted them from Houston and dragged them to LA two years ago. It sure as hell wasn't because a city full of space aliens was cool- it was, but no Strider would do something so unironic as to move cross-country to gawk at some shitty gray spacemen. No, it was because the Child Services in this city was so cripplingly overloaded that they had zero time to worry about anything that wasn't outright and blatant child molestation. All they had to do to be safe here was keep their shit quiet, and Dave had been doing that since the day he and Dirk had first left home together.

He could still remember, although vaguely, what it had been like living with Mom. Or rather, living in Mom's house, because she was hardly ever home and even when she was it was as a distant, unapproachable silhouette that smelled intriguingly of perfume and cocktails. For the first few years of their lives, Dave and his twin sister had been raised mostly by their older brother, the three of them rattling around together in a large mansion that oozed their mother's aura from every exquisite velvet pillow and immaculate marble statue.

Other than that, what Dave mostly remembered were the arguments. Dirk and Mom had fought all the time, mostly without even being in the same building, through the medium of small notes that would make Dirk's impassive face grow stony and cunning traps that would make Mom shatter wine glasses in her grip. But sometimes they would accidentally meet face-to-face, and Dave and his sister would watch as the pair held an exchange of quiet words that meant nothing but somehow sliced the air with hostile intent. Mom invariably came off better in these exchanges, winning the battle by some alchemy of motherhood that left Dirk cold and silent for hours afterward.

Dave had become angry on his behalf once, red-faced and fuming and breaking as many things as he could lay his fat little toddler hands on while his sister followed him around the house in floods of tears. Dirk had vanished upstairs and come back with the small sunglasses, identical to his own, that until that day had adorned Li'l Cal. He had knelt in front of Dave and slipped them solemnly onto his little brother's face with all the ceremony of King Arthur appointing a knight to fight by his side.

“Don't let her know she gets to you,” he had told them both. In their own ways, Dave and his sister had each taken the lesson to heart.

The moment Dirk was old enough to get emancipated and leave home he had grabbed a duffel bag and thrown as much of his stuff as he could grab into it. Mom had leaned on a door frame, sipping a Martini and watching him pack, offering helpful suggestions that her elder son ignored completely. Dave and his sister had watched, two impassive little faces hiding their confusion and fear until Dirk had swung his bag over one shoulder and crouched down beside them.

“Hey, sis, li'l bro, either of you interested in joining me?” he had asked. He sounded like he didn't really give a damn either way, but Dave knew better than to take his brother's words lightly. Then he saw Mom looking at the three of them, her face colder than he had ever seen it in his life, and he had realized that Dirk wasn't the only one who was hanging on their response. It hadn't taken more than a glance between him and his sister to work out a solution. He had tottered over to stand by his Bro while she had wrapped herself around her Mom's leg, both staring resolutely at their twin in mutual understanding and determination. One kid for each of them, the only fair split, and who fucking knows what was the better deal in the end.

Mom hadn't stopped them from leaving; in fact, she had helped Dave pack his bag, and when Dirk wouldn't take her credit card she had given it to her younger son instead. They had said their goodbyes pleasantly and without tears, the only sign of sincere sentiment when Dave had hugged his sister for a few moments longer than strictly necessary, and then the two boys had walked out of the front door, never to return again. Dirk had been barely sixteen and Dave had been almost six and the whole world had been waiting for them outside.

The next few weeks had been interesting, to say the least. Dirk had planned his escape and had a mechanic job waiting for him down in Texas, courtesy of a friend, but since he refused to use the credit card the promise of work was about all they had going for them. They traveled across the country on a bus that shook and rattled and smelled of sweat and piss, and they spent weeks living out of their bags on Dirk's friend's living room floor, eating ramen and popcorn for meals and staying up late watching hammer horror movies and mocking them mercilessly from their borrowed sleeping bags. Then the money had started coming in and Dave's brother had signed a lease on a shitty shoebox apartment. Things got better.

Bro bought the first two swords with his third paycheck, and started training Dave the same night. He'd gone easy on the little guy at first, teaching him the basics and letting him practice them before expecting him to keep up. It wasn't the only thing Bro had started to teach him. The day he changed their last name to Strider, Bro had come home with a pile of books and started homeschooling Dave. By the first anniversary of their moving into the apartment, their life had fallen into a pattern of studying and strifing and training that suited them both perfectly. They had held a celebration that night, burning the credit card and letting off fireworks from the roof of the building until a furious neighbor threatened to call the cops on them.

Things had changed again a couple of years later when Bro started his smuppet website. At first it had just been a side project, an ironic business venture that was barely supposed to break even. When the money from the site started to dwarf his salary, Bro had decided that enough was enough and quit his day job. The apartment had filled with colorful plush rumps, and they had become a regular feature of Bro's traps and tests. Dave had no illusions about where their money came from, but he didn't give a shit. More importantly to him, Bro's comings and goings were no longer tied to a regular job, making his whereabouts at any given moment entirely a matter of speculation. Dave had thought he was wary before, but soon he became a whole new level of paranoid.

And then the troll ship had crash-landed in California and the Striders had packed their bags anew, once more to head to greener pastures. Life in California was much the same as it had been in Texas. The apartment was slightly larger but no less shitty, the smuppets were still out in force, and they were still the coolest damn dudes to ever drop sick beats in any city, ever, period. Not that there hadn't been changes, too. California was stricter on homeschooling than Texas had been, and rather than risk running afoul of the red tape Bro had just enrolled Dave in public school and told him to stay sharp. The major irritation that was going to school every morning and listening to idiot teachers who wanted him to read some shitty literature by dead assholes was more than compensated for by making some actual, real-life friends who would paste printouts of his ironically crappy webcomic to their lockers and listen to his bullshit every day and still hang out with him during summer vacation. Okay, so his friends were completely batshit insane, but they were also more than just some text on a screen.

Not that there was actually anything wrong with friends who were text on a screen. Dave felt his spirits lift a little as he flopped down on his computer chair and saw the blue words waiting patiently in his Pesterchum window. Using one hand to eat and one hand to type, Dave greeted his best friend of any life, real or virtual.

TG: hey egbert im back  
TG: i know you missed me

After a moment the program pinged in reply.

GT: hi dave!  
GT: did you get some cool food for your lunch?

Dave sighed.

TG: no such thing as cool food egderp  
TG: unless im eating it  
TG: then all food is cool  
TG: so yes my lunch is cool

Unsurprisingly, it took John less than a second to respond.

GT: hehehe!  
GT: but what are you eating?

Dave plucked another slice out of the box and took a bite, winding long strands of stretching cheese around his tongue as he typed.

TG: okay if itll shut you up  
TG: pepperoni pizza  
TG: are you happy now or do you want to obsess more over my diet  
TG: cos i gotta tell you dude that my nutritional adviser will kick your ass  
TG: he is a hella jealous bitch  
TG: actually i think he might be more than a bit warm for this striders form

He could almost hear John laughing at the words. They'd spoken before over webcam, so he knew all about Egbert's buck teeth and square glasses and unruly black hair, but most of all he knew what Egbert sounded like. Even when he was being serious you could almost hear the giggles trying to break out from under his words. It made it impossible to tell when he was planning some stupid prank, too- for all his poker-faced prowess, Dave could never work out when his friend was laughing at him because he was about to pull something and when he was laughing just because he was happy.

GT: sorry if i'm obsessing!  
GT: my dad's been baking a lot today, and i'm trying to avoid him.  
GT: not to mention the thought of cake.  
GT: save me from the cake, dave!

Dave felt his lip twitch, trying to put a smile on his impassive face. He had never seen Egbert senior, but he could easily imagine his friend running for his life from a huge frosted confection.

TG: sorry dude  
TG: nothing i can do about this tragedy  
TG: ill give you a sick eulogy though  
TG: your life in rap at your funeral  
TG: theyll be putting up statues to you by the time im done  
TG: saying wow thats a shame  
TG: he was the bravest of the brave  
TG: keeping us all safe from the evil batterwitch crocker and her twisted baking schemes

Dave was just getting into his stride when John interrupted, breaking his flow and making him pause.

GT: daaave!

Oh, well. Not like it was important shit. Dave took the opportunity to scarf the last pizza slice as John typed.

GT: you know, my dad's planning to send some of this cake with me next week.  
GT: so you won't escape unscathed from this.  
GT: you are going to have so much cake, you won't even know what to do with it!  
GT: all of the cake, dave.  
GT: that's what you're getting.

Dave snorted and wiped his greasy fingers off on his jeans before putting them to the keyboard. The apartment might be a mess, but that was no reason to dirty his tech up.

TG: not a problem dude  
TG: on the remote chance bro and i do not want all of the delicious baked confectionery you bring  
TG: i have the perfect plan to ditch it  
TG: theres a couple of homeless troll kids right outside my building  
TG: bet theyd fucking eat it if i tossed it their way

Not without some serious sass, though. Dave's eyebrow twitched briefly towards a frown. If arguing with the little gray fucker wasn't so much fun, he would probably have chased the asshole off his doorstep long ago. Then again, maybe not. The lanky one with the nasty facial scars might be more polite but there was something about him that made Dave's skin crawl more than seeing a tripwire attached to a firework. Bro had taught him not to ignore his gut instinct, especially when it was screaming bloody murder.

GT: wait, seriously?  
GT: wow, that's cool!  
GT: i'm really looking forward to meeting all your awesome troll friends when i get there!

Dave couldn't help letting out a small groan.

TG: okay what the fuck  
TG: stop derping right now  
TG: first of all i want to be clear  
TG: tiny tim and orphan annie are not my friends  
TG: in fact i am a fucking saint  
TG: feeding them while orphan annie calls me all kinds of shit like a whiny little bitch  
TG: and tiny timmy gives me the evil fucking eye  
TG: or possibly just the hallucinating stoner eye i dont know

Dave realized slightly too late that of course John had to give the most inane, derpish response possible.

GT: wow dave, they sound kind of dangerous!

Dave rolled his eyes and reminded himself that John lived in a nice house, in a nice suburb, with a caring guardian who didn't assault him with anything more lethal than Betty Crocker batter mixes.

TG: no really do you think so  
TG: of course theyre dangerous egbert  
TG: trolls are dangerous  
TG: all those pointy fangs and sharp fucking claws and oh yeah super strength  
TG: its like a party in the fucking knife drawer at the best of times  
TG: and trolls without symbols are even worse

Confused, John interjected again.

GT: what do you mean?

Dave snorted, although John couldn't hear him and Bro would flip his shit at the slip in Dave's stony demeanor.

TG: dont interrupt egderp  
TG: for your information all trolls have this individual symbol  
TG: its like some huge deal in troll culture  
TG: they stick it on everything  
TG: you should see the graffiti around here  
TG: looks like some conference of mad alchemists got loose and had a street battle  
TG: but for some reason when theyre homeless they dont do it  
TG: its like they all go whelp  
TG: thats it  
TG: no place to stay  
TG: time to go jump in the goodwill bin and dress like the fucking leprechaun king of the land of shitty gray and rainbows  
TG: tiny tim and orphan annie are rocking the leprechaun look  
TG: and other trolls are crossing the street to steer clear of them  
TG: so yeah theyre dangerous  
TG: but theyre not gonna start anything over some trash talk

At least he didn't think they would. Maybe he should have asked a few more questions of his school friends before he started antagonizing the kids? Then again, he was a Strider. He could handle himself if shit got real. Bro had trained him for that exact reason and he wasn't going to embarrass them both by getting dismembered or some crap like that.

Pesterchum pinged again, alerting him to John's reply.

GT: uh, if you say so dave.  
GT: i mean, you know them better than me!  
GT: but you said that was the first thing. what's second?

Oh, right. Discouraging the derp from geeking out when he saw real live trolls.

TG: yeah second thing  
TG: act chill when you meet my school friends okay  
TG: if you go in all derp derp wow im meeting space aliens  
TG: terezi is gonna smell it a mile off  
TG: she will chew you up and spit you out and i wont stop her

Actually Dave was pretty sure she would do that anyway. Their friendship was founded on their mutual love of winding people up and watching them flip the fuck out, Dave wearing his solid poker face and Terezi with a mad cackle of delight. John's innocent pranks, while effective, weren't even close to the same league of fucked up adolescent cruelty. It was part of what Dave liked about the guy.

GT: uh, literally?

Maybe he shouldn't have been so graphic right after the rant on how dangerous trolls were. Dave hurried to clear up the misunderstanding.

TG: no not literally  
TG: although she will definitely lick you  
TG: dont worry about that its just her thing  
TG: but ive warned her to be on her best behavior for meeting my best bro  
TG: now im warning you the same thing  
TG: these are my friends egbert  
TG: not some shitty tourist attraction  
TG: you cant tie them to your drivers mirror and watch them swing when you speed round corners  
TG: they are not advertised on the side of the highway for gullible tourists with pushy brats  
TG: they are not in the guiness book of records  
TG: you do not tell stories of seeing them to your little egderp grandkids

Hopefully that would make the point clear. Dave sat back and waiting for John's reply. It seemed to take a bit longer than usual, and when the computer pinged he leaned in close to read his friend's words.

GT: sorry dave.  
GT: i didn't mean to get carried away!  
GT: it's just so cool that i'm going to meet you.  
GT: and of course the fact that you live in troll central is not in the least bit cool and amazing, hehehe.  
GT: i just  
GT: i guess i'm a bit worried.

Dave actually did frown this time, for a fraction of a second.

TG: worried  
TG: what are you worried about  
TG: youve got me to watch your back

The reply was slow coming again, as if John was picking his words carefully. 

GT: i know that.  
GT: i'm just being stupid and getting scared by dumb stuff again.

It was easy to forget that cheerful, happy-go-lucky John Egbert got scared or upset at all. The first time Dave had been witness to an Egbert meltdown he had thought it was a prank until his friend's father had messaged him to tell him otherwise. When John had actually told him about his issues with clowns and harlequins, his first reaction had been disbelief. If the cake phobia had been bizarre, the fact that John had actually needed to go to therapy to handle his clown nightmares had been utterly disconcerting. Dave had tried not to bother John about it, but his beloved and meddlesome sister had no such scruples, and according to her amateur psychologist crap the harlequins haunting their mutual friend's subconscious were most likely an artifact of whatever had happened to him as a baby, before he was adopted by Mr. Egbert.

Dave was no expert, but he thought that was bullshit. They'd known John's twin sister over Pesterchum even longer than they'd known him, and for all the weird and eccentric behavior she displayed fear of clowns was not amongst her quirks. They'd been together until they were adopted, which meant as far as Dave was concerned whatever troubles John had were either his own dumb fault or Egbert senior's. No prizes for guessing who to blame the cake hate on, either.

At any rate, the hesitant answer told him everything he needed to know about what was worrying his friend.

TG: look dont worry about that stupid ringmaster  
TG: hes never killed a human  
TG: which i should probably get all upset about  
TG: call him a speciesist asshole or some crap like that  
TG: but right now that means im safe and youre safe  
TG: and no amount of shitty serial killer circus paintings are going to change that

The reply came back faster this time, which was probably a good sign. Dave hoped it was, anyway. Without seeing John's face it was hard to be sure.

GT: dave, those paintings are done in blood.  
GT: he tears people apart and uses their blood to paint clowns on walls.  
GT: aren't you at least worried about your troll friends?

This time it was Dave who hesitated, because truthfully he was slightly anxious. It didn't matter how often his friends reassured him or how steadfastly the Ringmaster stuck to the streets to find his victims; he was still afraid that one day he would go to school and one of them would be missing, dead and broken in some back alley somewhere, another victim for the police to find like a bad cop show cliche. But that wasn't what John needed to hear.

TG: no way  
TG: theres no chance hed go after them  
TG: and even if he did theyd kick his ass  
TG: so come on  
TG: dont let this murderous asshole get in the way of our epic bromance  
TG: i am going to meet your plane at the airport tomorrow  
TG: so youd better fucking be on it  
TG: running out to meet me like the chick from one of your shitty movies  
TG: and im the rugged action hero whos just saved the world from terrorists or meteorites or some shit  
TG: standing there in a torn wifebeater and covered in soot and blood  
TG: still holding my magic gun that doesnt run out of bullets  
TG: and all the press are standing around going  
TG: hey mister strider  
TG: we hear youre the guy who just saved our collective asses  
TG: please let us bask in your reflected glory  
TG: and some woman is pushing herself forward  
TG: she wants me to sign her tits  
TG: but im like no fucking way in hell  
TG: i gotta meet my bro now so your tits gotta wait

John really did like his shitty action movies. He sent them to Dave sometimes, in internet links and brown parcels covered in too much tape, and Dave watched them for the purposes of irony before sending John links to the shittiest unsubtitled Japanese monster films he could trawl up from the unhallowed depths of the internet. He was pretty sure Egbert actually watched and enjoyed them seriously.

GT: well, i guess i can't refuse an invitation like that!  
GT: although i think id rather be nick cage in this scenario, stepping down off the plane to reunite with my loving family.  
GT: you are the loving family in this picture, dave.  
GT: it is you.

Dave let out a small sigh of relief. Egbert was calmed, and would be arriving as planned. The thought reminded him that he had some other important business to attend to regarding that visit.

TG: okay egbert  
TG: i will be the adoring mother of your squalling brat offspring  
TG: but right now i need you to watch the kid  
TG: i have to go call terezi and make sure shes got her shit together  
TG: talk again soon  
TG: unless bro reappears before then  
TG: in which case talk to you later

Dave swore slightly under his breath as he realized that he should probably have checked under the bed and in the closet before settling down in the room. Oh well. He could do it when he stood up. The fact that Bro hadn't attacked him yet didn't mean he wouldn't when Dave was leaving his bedroom.

GT: okay! talk to you later.  
GT: oh, and...  
GT: see you soon, dave!

Dave carefully didn't smile as he signed out of Pesterchum and grabbed his piece of shit sword from where it was leaning against the desk. He remained mindful of his surroundings as he crouched to poke under the bed, which proved to be clean, and opened the closet from the side. That unleashed a small deluge of smuppets, but no Bro. Dave pushed his bedroom door open with the sword and looked up as well as both ways as he entered the corridor. No creepy ventriloquist dummy, no sudden attack from an invisible assailant. Damn. Bro was keeping him up on tenterhooks today.

The phone was sat on the kitchen counter. Technically Dave could have called Terezi from his mobile, or pestered her on the internet, but by unspoken agreement the house phone was a mobile demilitarized zone. With Bro in his current mood, Dave wanted to guarantee the unbroken communication. He grabbed the cordless handset and threw himself onto the sofa with only a momentary hesitation to pull out a wayward smuppet from under the cushion and throw it violently across the room. Terezi's number was stored in the phone and Dave heard the other end ring out before the answer phone kicked in. A mature and pleasant woman's voice spoke; the recording was far clearer and less hurried than most, but presentation aside the words were still the usual mindless drivel.

“Hi, you've reached Cathy and Terezi! We're not in right now, but if you leave a message after the tone we'll get right back to you.”

Dave hung up before the long beep was finished and flicked through the saved numbers in the handset until he reached M for Matt. This time the phone only managed a couple of trills before it was picked up.

“Hey, Coolkid!” cackled a voice that would have been melodic if it wasn't so deranged. “You found me!”

“Not exactly hard, 'Rezi,” Dave replied in his very best monotone. “You're not at home, so you're either at Matt's, the Francisco place, or with me. And I think I woulda noticed a hot crazy blind chick hanging around the apartment.”

There was a bout of crackling laughter from the other end of the line. “Ah, but how can I be hot when I'm so chill, Dave? Surely if I was both at once, it would cause adverse weather conditions.”

“Fuckin' right it would,” Dave told her, leaning back against the arm of the couch. “You are a fuckin' hurricane, 'Rezi. Everyone runs for their basements when you walk down the street; they are issuing warnings to the airports for tornadoes and waterspouts. Old witches are trembling in fear of falling cottages when you're around. You are the perfect fuckin' storm, one hundred percent casualties and not a dry eye in the theater.”

Terezi laughed again. “Thanks, coolkid,” she snickered. “You have earned a minute of my time. But be aware we're about to head out to the Franciscos' for an evening of sophisticated dining, so make it quick.”

“Whoa, careful there girl. Do you even know how to have a civilized dinner?” Dave swung himself to sit upright on the couch as the designers intended. “You know you ain't supposed to lick the host, right?”

“Ha, ha,” Terezi said, but she didn't sound cross. “I didn't just get off the ship, you know. Besides, I already know what George and Susan look like.”

“Gross,” Dave said, suppressing a grin. He was certain Bro was watching him from somewhere.

“Look, Dave, you know I love talking to your delicious strawberry self, but Cathy's waiting by the door and I think Matt is about to disconnect the phone. Do you think you can tell me what this is all about?”

Dave sighed. “Well, breaks my heart to hear it, but a cool chick's gotta do what a cool chick's gotta do. Just wanted to let you know that John's flight is coming in at one tomorrow, and ask you what time we should come round so Bro can start playing chauffeur for this circus.”

There was a pause on the other end of the phone; Dave could hear voices, but the words were too muffled to make out. He amused himself by trying to recalculate how many entrance and exit points the room had until Terezi came back on the line.

“Cathy says we can have the car all day tomorrow so long as we bring it back undamaged,” she told him. “Can you get here for ten? That should leave plenty of time to collect your John friend.”

“Yeah, that's fine. Do you...” Dave began. He didn't get to finish, unless a yelp as the couch flipped up and tipped him sprawling across the floor counted. The phone slid off to rest under the TV stand, and Dave looked up to see Bro leaning casually on the upturned furniture.

“Not cool, dude,” he protested. “I was on the phone!”

Bro responded by tossing him a sheathed sword. “Roof, now,” he ordered, and then he was gone. Dave groaned and scrambled to his feet, sparing a glare for the blank face of Li'l Cal. The ventriloquist's dummy sat where Bro had been leaning, watching Dave to make sure he did as he was told. Sparing a second to retrieve the now disconnected phone and drop it back in its cradle, Dave slipped out of the kitchen window onto the fire escape and started jogging up to the roof. Terezi would understand- hell, she would probably laugh about it tomorrow.

Right now he had to keep his mind on the game. Bro thought he needed sharpening up so he wouldn't be going easy. Maybe that was a good thing too: with John coming for a visit, the last thing Dave wanted to be was sloppy. Ringmaster or no Ringmaster, it was up to him to keep his friend safe in this shit-hole of a city, and he had no intention whatsoever of screwing up such a vital task.


	4. ==> Be The Gleeful Blind Investigator

### CHAPTER THREE ==> Be The Gleeful Blind Investigator

Terezi Pyrope hung up the phone as soon as it became clear that her best buddy was otherwise occupied; at least she and Dave had managed to organize the important details for tomorrow. Her nose led her straight to the deliciously cherry-colored handbag she had left on a handy surface nearby, and she slipped it neatly over one shoulder. When Cathy had first suggested she carry the accessory she had refused, certain it was nothing more than another pointless human fashion. Then she had realized that whatever reason human females might have for handbags, she could use it productively. Usually that meant carrying her chalks, her phone, a well-licked credit card, pepper spray and a tazer. She would have carried more weaponry, but that would have been illegal. Humans were strange like that.

“Hey, squirt, you coming?” Matt said, from the direction of the cool draft of air that meant the doorway. Terezi turned towards his voice and favored him with a wide grin. Technically Matt was just their neighbor, but he and Cathy were in a love-romance which made him really more like family, which was another confusing human concept- but one that was excessively easy to become fond of. Of course, there were other good reasons why Terezi liked to stick close to the man that smelled of nicotine and doughnuts and worn leather.

“Can we go in your car?” she asked as she drew close to the human couple. Cathy chuckled, but Matt groaned. Terezi felt the air move as he ran a hand across his face.

“No,” he said. “Not a chance. You are never getting near my radio again.”

Terezi cackled. It had been _fun_ talking to police dispatch, and even more fun when she had found the tasty blueberry light under the seat, but she supposed she had overdone it a little. Matt had shouted quite a lot that day, but he had also forgiven her in the end. He always did.

“I'm driving,” Cathy said, and Terezi just knew without having to see it that Matt had tensed up: jealous and competitive, same machismo as usual. She chuckled and slipped her hand into his, grabbing hold of Cathy with the other, enjoying the startlingly different textures of the two alien hands- his rough and strong and gentle, hers thin and soft and sharp at the fingertips. They traveled to the car like that, riding the elevator with Terezi hanging between them like a six-year-old human child. The air was warm and smelled of exhaust fumes and human sweat and the sea. Terezi loved the smell of LA, so different from her wild forest on Alternia and the closed, sterilized fear on the ship. LA was foul, but it was alive.

Matt called shotgun before Terezi could, so she got meekly in behind the passenger seat and resolved to spend the rest of the journey kicking his back through the chair. He would try to tell her off, she would be unrepentant, and Cathy would refuse to get involved. It was not the first time she had used the tactic, and he deserved it for refusing to buckle up properly and complaining so loudly every time she beat him to shotgun.

With the window wound down Terezi could keep track of where they were as they traveled. Each of the districts had its own unique smell, and she knew the route by heart. When Cathy had first met her the human woman had been skeptical of the blind girl's other senses; now she was proud of her adoptive daughter's perception. Terezi for her part was constantly astonished by how well her new lusus- no, mother- adapted to and even predicted the needs of her troll daughter. On Alternia, there had been nobody to look after her. Her unhatched lusus had contacted her psychically to advise her in dreams, but the fetal dragon had never been able to physically defend her or offer any kind of tangible assistance. Terezi had never thought that mattered. She had never needed anyone to help her, because she was there to help others. At first that had simply meant orchestrating the demise of the wicked, but after the FLARPing accident she never felt her duty more keenly than when administering justice in defense of her friends.

Accident. That was one way to put it. Betrayal was another. Vengeance, viciousness, tragedy, bloody warfare, pick one or all of them. What do you call it when your friend, your comrade-in-arms, your _sister_ , starts a chain of events that leaves three of you maimed and one so close to dead it makes no difference? Terezi had agreed to a truce, but she had not forgiven her former partner and she certainly had not forgotten what she was capable of. It was the whole reason she had boarded the ship in the first place. It was the reason she had heard about it at all, because when her erstwhile friend had bullied and tricked the information out of Tavros he had run straight to Terezi for help.

AT: uH, tEREZI?  
AT: aRE YOU THERE?  
AT: i THINK i JUST DID SOMETHING REALLY REALLY BAD,

What else could she have done but try to calm him down?

GC: R3L4X T4VROS, 1T C4N'T B3 TH4T B4D 1F YOU D1D 1T  
GC: YOU 4R3 B4S1C4LLY TH3 B1GG3ST WUSS ON 4LL OF 4LT3RN14 >:]

Her words had not been as soothing as she had intended.

AT: yEAH, THAT, UH,  
AT: tHAT IS, KIND OF THE PROBLEM?  
AT: i UM,  
AT: tHE THING IS,  
AT: uM,  
AT: yOU SEE, THERE'S THIS SECRET?  
AT: aND i'M NOT SUPPOSED TO TELL?  
AT: bUT, UM,  
AT: i DID,

It wasn't the first time Tavros had felt bad about small stuff, but the way he had said it set Terezi's spine tingling. His chocolatey words had tasted of more than just awkward embarrassment and guilt. They had tasted of deeper shame and fear, and that was a signature she recognized.

GC: 1T W4S H3R W4SNT 1T? >:[

It was a few moments before Tavros replied, and when he did it was hardly an answer at all.

AT: …

Fortunately his silence was thoroughly informative for an eager young legislacerator hopeful.

GC: T4VROS 1 N33D YOU TO B3 HON3ST W1TH M3  
GC: WH4T D1D YOU T3LL H3R?

The story had spilled out of him hesitantly, and Terezi had needed to interrogate some of her other contacts to put it all together properly, but soon enough the picture was clear. The Condesce's Descendent, a girl her own age who was becoming known as the Heiress, was planning to steal a ship and leave Alternia with as many young trolls as wanted to join her. Tavros had heard about it from Aradia's old flame, and their foe had got wind that something was up and had pressed the weak-willed young troll for information. Terezi was of course disturbed by the grand larceny and treason that was about to take place, but was more unnerved by what her adversary might do with that knowledge. She could not allow whatever schemes were being hatched to come to fruition, and if that meant becoming a part of the seditious movement, so be it. The practical considerations of both her and Tavros' infirmities, and what it could mean for them in the long run, were of course no factor in her decision. No worthy legislacerator would let fear of death- or culling- stand in the way of justice. She would do what was right at any cost.

So it was that she had stuck by Tavros and protected the secret, and when the time came to board the shuttles they had still been side by side. The ship itself had proven to be a rich environment for the greedy, the arrogant and the vain to exercise their ambitions, and time and again her investigations had thwarted the power-hungry plotting of her fellow refugees and her rival. She had kept herself busy between times by keeping order in the section she and Tavros lived in. The smell of fear and respect on the other trolls had filled her with pride as she strode the corridors, as did knowing that the territory under her care had less thefts, less fights, less injuries and less deaths than any other area half the size on the ship. When the sopor first grew scarce and then ran out and the Night of Blood came, she had organized the barricades and she had defended them, and anyone inside the zone acting out had been chained to the bulkhead or, if they were truly insensible, culled outright. After that she had been a hero to her people; the beacon that kept the nightmares at bay. Inwardly she had chafed, certain that her nemesis had been out killing with the other highbloods and unable to prove a thing.

Arrival on Earth had changed everything. Overnight she had gone from a protector, a guardian and a leader to just another lost kid on an alien world. Part of her missed the power, but the rest of her had seen and done enough to be glad to surrender the responsibility. When they left Quarantine for a group home, she was almost pleased that her hated enemy vanished on the first night. Almost. Terezi had claimed Tavros and she were moirails to keep them together; a lie, but not one she regretted in the least. She would much rather have him where she could see him. If the other returned, she would target him first as she always did, and Terezi would be ready and waiting.

The Franciscos and Cathy had come on the same day; Terezi suspected even in the same car. She had stalked the humans around the house as she did with all of the potential lusii, sniffing the air to see if they stank of deception or ill intent. George had noticed her and with a smile asked what she was doing. When she had told him the plain truth, Cathy had been the one to laugh while the Franciscos tried to hide their surprise at her bluntness. They had recovered fast, but from that moment the tall woman who smelled of lavender and roses and a bleached laboratory was Terezi's favorite. They had come with her to meet Tavros, whose shyness and generally pathetic nature had been a huge hit with every adult human they'd met so far. The three Terezi had found were no different in that respect, but they impressed her by talking to her as well, unperturbed by her more trollish nature and making no unnecessary or humiliating allowances for her blindness.

Terezi hadn't even realized how much time they had all spent talking until much later, when she and Tavros were visited by their social worker and told that someone had asked about adopting each of them. It had happened quickly after that, the system desperate to get them placed, and before she knew it Terezi had been moving her few possessions into Cathy's apartment while the Francisco family took Tavros home. Matt had been there to greet her when she climbed out of Cathy's car. She had met him before during the adoption process, but it wasn't until he was helping her to unpack her prized box set of NYPD Blue that she learned he and George were cops.

At the time she had thought that having a cop for a neighbor and his partner as her friend's caretaker made her new home perfect. She had been wrong. What made it perfect was a thousand little things that she hadn't even known she was missing until they were there. When she got out of bed in the morning to find that Cathy had made pancakes for them both. When she drew an intentionally shitty picture and dropped it under the table and smelled it later stuck to the fridge with a lovely lime magnet. When she listened to the television and didn't understand something, and Cathy would explain it with an arm around her shoulders. Terezi supposed that this was what it was like to have a proper lusus but Tavros had told her it wasn't quite the same thing, although he was living with four humans so he probably had a different perspective. Terezi didn't particularly care- just as long as Cathy kept buying the cheap, bright syrups for the breakfast pancakes. The strawberry one ran out particularly often; Terezi loved the flavor of the vibrant red color as much as the sweet chemical taste. Sometimes she didn't even wait for pancakes to eat it with.

School had been another interesting experience. Thanks to the sudden rush on school places and the unwillingness of many institutions to accept Alternian students it had taken some time for her and Tavros to get enrolled. The school they had ended up in wasn't the best- Terezi had been overwhelmed by Cathy's heated reaction to the whole messy business- but it wasn't terrible either. It was at school that they had met Dave. More accurately, Terezi had accosted the boy in the cherry red t-shirt and licked him, and had been more than impressed when his response was a calm, “'Sup, gray girl?” The three of them soon became as thick as thieves and twice as sly, navigating the treacherous waters of their Freshman year with wit, grace, panache, and in Tavros' case the coolest pair of bodyguards ever to don shades. Not that she didn't study, too: as a biochemist, Cathy valued education. She made it clear that she not only considered Terezi to be intelligent, but that she expected that brainpower to be put to good use. Terezi had no objections. If some stupid humans didn't want to let her into the good schools, she would simply prove exactly how much she was capable of. They would regret their folly one day.

And now Dave's internet friend John was coming to visit. Terezi thought it would be interesting to meet this mysterious individual who held so much sway over her cherry coolkid's life. She had tried to scout him out on Pesterchum, of course, but Dave had seen that coming and warned John against talking to her. Her entire conversation with him had consisted of one line, in which he identified her as “Dave's troll girl friend, but not girlfriend, hehehe! Sorry but I'm not supposed to talk to you yet.” Then he had blocked her. She didn't know exactly what to make of him from that, but he was certainly intriguing enough for a second look.

Tavros was excited to meet John too, but Tavros was excited about most things on Earth. Terezi smiled to herself as the car swung into the peaceful suburban neighborhood where the Francisco family lived. It smelled of mown grass and sprinklers, and she could hear the children and barkbeasts playing in the distance. The place was too tame and peaceful for her liking, but for her more withdrawn friend it was a perfect fit.

As they pulled up in the drive and exited the car, Terezi made sure to turn away from the still, heavy presence of the house and pull a face directed roughly across the street. The woman who lived there had tried to forbid her daughter from playing with the Francisco children since Tavros moved in. It hadn't stuck in the least, not when the girl was such good friends with Emily Francisco, but after nearly a sweep and a half of protecting him on the ship making Tavros feel bad was outright criminal behavior in Terezi's book.

“Come on, 'Rezi,” Cathy called from the doorway. Terezi walked up and as she drew closer she smelled George waiting. She waved to the stockier policeman.

“Hi,” she said, giving him her best grin. He snorted a little, seeing right through her.

“Tavros and Emily are upstairs,” he said, and she darted past him- with a brief call of greeting to Susan in the kitchen- to race unfaltering to Tavros' room. She knew that was where they would be, of course, because it was always easier to go to Tavros than it was for him to reach other people, and she knew the layout of this house as well as the apartment building she lived in. She burst dramatically through the door and pointed her cane accusingly at the room.

“Confess!” she ordered. There was a brief moment of confusion, then Emily and Tavros both started giggling. She flopped down next to the young human girl on the floor and fumbled for one of the cards they were playing with, giving it a quick lick. It was in a plastic sleeve- Tavros had learned that lesson the hard way after her first visit to his new home.

“Pokemon?” she asked, genuinely curious. “Oh, that's the one like Fiduspawn, right?”

“Um, yeah,” Tavros said. To Terezi's practiced ear, he sounded happy. “I mean, it's not quite the same, because you don't actually have any monsters, but I think that's kind of better? Because I don't feel sad when they die now.”

“They don't die!” Emily squeaked. “They just fall unconscious and go back to their pokeballs!”

Terezi turned her head towards her friend and felt the air shift as he shrugged awkwardly.

“I, uh, I've been teaching Emily to play,” he explained. “She's, um, pretty good.”

Emily leaned over, raising a hand to whisper conspiratorially to Terezi. “I won the last three matches!”

Terezi turned suspiciously to Tavros, who shrugged again. She narrowed her unseeing eyes. Most people might have taken Emily's wins at face value, but Terezi knew that her friend had spent a _lot_ of time playing Fiduspawn on the ship and he was good. Good enough to reliably win rations and favors from people, which meant more than good enough to best a ten-year-old human wiggler. Then again, any human wiggler trained in card games by Tavros would probably obliterate lesser competition, so perhaps there was something to be said for letting her have a few apparently hard-won victories. Terezi put the card back down at a random point on the ground and remembered she had a message to deliver.

“Oh yes, Tavros? We will be coming by to pick you up at about eleven tomorrow.” Terezi scooted back until she bumped into the bed, curling her feet up and leaning on her cane. “Do not be late, as Bro has to get all of us to the airport in time to meet John's plane two hours later.”

“Uh, okay 'Rezi,” Tavros muttered. “Do I, um, do I, have to bring, anything?”

“Just yourself, hotshot,” she told him, and even though she couldn't see it she could imagine his toothy smile. She let a similar expression slide onto her own face as she listened to them resume their game. She didn't really understand most of it- Fiduspawn had never been her thing, not direct enough- but pretty soon she had declared that all unconscious Pokemon were to report to Justice Terezi to answer for their failure. There were enough soft Pokemon toys around Tavros' room for her to hold impromptu trials for the offenders, and soon the card game was forgotten as Emily and Tavros pleaded for the lives of their favorites. In an Alternian courtblock they would all have been culled before His Tyranny, but this was Earth so Terezi considered the cases carefully on their individual merits and only ended up executing half of them. Their plush bodies swung haplessly from the end of the bed, waiting to be cut down and rescued by Tavros when she returned home. Terezi grinned as justice was administered, and Emily and Tavros alternated between wailing theatrically and giggling hopelessly at her proclamations.

All too soon Susan called them from the foot of the stairs, and George came up to see if they needed any help getting Tavros down. They declined, Terezi wheeling him over to the top of the stair-lift and Tavros maneuvering himself out of the wheelchair. Emily insisted on helping to carry his chair down, and at the bottom he again refused help to get himself back into the device. Terezi as always took a moment to admire the ingenious stair-riding chair. Like the electric wheelchair that sat by the front door, it was a purely human invention that could have been made just for Tavros. He completed them just as much as the devices helped him.

Buck arrived just as they were settling in their seats, and Terezi could smell his presence from the haze of cigarette smoke and alcohol that followed him. She raised a single eyebrow in his direction as he slumped uncaring into the eighth space at the table. The disapproval of his parents was thick in the air.

“I thought I told you to be back an hour ago,” George said.

“Yeah, like you even care,” Buck muttered, not looking at his father. “Not like they aren't here all the time anyway.”

The tablecloth rustled as George leaned forward, smelling of frowns and serious intent. “That's not the point, Buck,” he said. “Matt and Cathy are good friends of ours, and Terezi is friends with your brother and sister...”

“Brother, right,” Buck said, sullen. Terezi could feel Tavros shrinking beside her, trying to vanish under the table. “I mean, why bother with the son you actually have when you can get a new _alien_ son. That's so much better.”

The temperature of the room did not change, but Terezi could feel Susan shivering.

“Leave this room. Right now.” George's eyes didn't leave his son, who slowly got up and practically threw his chair under the table before stalking out of the room. The front door slammed. After a long, awkward moment, Terezi got up and followed him out to the lawn-ring. He was standing on the green grass, looking up at a sky that was still bright with late afternoon sun. The usually blue skies of Earth were more orange at the edges, and Terezi took a deep breath of all the rich, heady colors around her.

“Do you have to sniff and lick everything?”

Terezi turned her head towards Buck and pointed at her sleek opaque red glasses. “Blind, remember?”

He kicked angrily at the turf. “Freak.”

Terezi cackled. “Yes, I am.” She walked up to stand beside him, turning her face towards the warm glow of the sun. “You know, I burned my eyes out doing this,” she said casually. Buck shifted beside her and she could sense his surprise.

“Really?”

“Yes,” she hissed, remembering the distant anger and the pain and the loss. Her fists clenched tightly, claws pricking her skin as her cheeks flushed with teal blood. On Alternia, that blood had made her a respected member of the middle classes, only a shade shy of nobility. On Earth, it reminded everyone that she was alien, an outsider who didn't belong. “The sun on Alternia was brighter than on Earth,” she said, perhaps to herself. There was another long pause as Terezi stared directly into the sun that she couldn't see.

“I'm sorry,” Buck said, and Terezi knew that he didn't mean about her eyes. She reached out and squeezed his hand gently. Sometimes it was hard to remember that they were the same age, when he seemed so young. Or was she the one who seemed old?

“Your father is scared that you'll get hurt,” she told him. “And your mother is scared that he will drive you away.” She stepped in front of him and raised her head, did her best to seem as though she was looking him in the eye. The opaque glasses helped with that, hiding her clumsy sightless gaze. “What are you scared of, Bad Boy?” she asked, her mouth splitting into a grin. Though the hand she was still holding, she felt him shudder.

“None of your business,” he answered. Shaky but brave. This one would be a hard nut to crack, but Terezi was a mistress of interrogation. No secrets were safe beneath the penetrating questions of the legislacerator! She tightened her grip on his hand ever so slightly and tilted her head to a thoughtful angle.

“I think you are afraid that they don't love you. That they don't care about you. I think you are afraid of letting them down, Bad Boy Buck.” She leaned in close, whispered in his ear. “You know if they didn't care, they wouldn't get so angry when you scare them.”

He pushed her away violently and left her sprawling on the grass. “Get the hell away from me!” he yelled, retreating back into the house. Terezi leaned back on the grass and laughed, breathing in the fresh apple green lawn and her victory. She gave him a few minutes before she righted herself, smoothed her skirt, and trotted back into the Francisco residence through the door that he had predictably left ajar.

When she arrived in the dining room, there was only one empty seat. Terezi grinned at Buck as she sat, knowing that he wouldn't dare look at her for the rest of the meal. Tavros was gaping at her in astonishment, probably wondering how she had managed it, but she wouldn't tell. Oh no. This was her little secret.

After a moment, Matt reached over and picked up the salad bowl, and slowly the tension started to bleed out of the room. Susan asked Cathy how her work was going, and Cathy tried to simplify a year and a half of complex hemospectrum research into regular English. Matt rescued her by asking Tavros how he was doing with his religious studies, and his stammered response was interrupted by Susan proudly reporting that the Rabbi had just the other day called Tavros his brightest student in years. George wanted to know if Terezi had started going out with that Strider boy yet, and there had been peals of laughter from around the table when she pointed out that if Dave was going to date a High School Sweetheart it would be strictly for ironic purposes. Terezi kept her attention on Buck while the conversation washed over her; he wasn't really joining in or responding to any of the questions that were asked of him. She made a note to talk to him after the meal and make sure he knew she had her eye on him.

Then, as it often did, the conversation turned to cop talk and Terezi couldn't focus on anything else. Especially not when the talk of the department was the vicious serial killer known as the Ringmaster! Susan tried to hush her husband as she usually did when he and Matt got into it, but Terezi cut in to ask a question and after that there was nothing that could stop the wonderful flow of criminal justice chatter. Personally knowing the men investigating the case was the best thing. The absolute best.

“There's been some new developments on the case,” George said, spearing a tomato on his fork. “The news was released to the press a few hours ago.”

“What news?” Terezi asked, leaning forwards onto the table.

“Two new victims last night,” Matt told her. “And here's the biggie; the second one's human.”

“Matt!” George protested. “We are not supposed to reveal that!”

“Why not?” Cathy asked, looking between the two men. “Is this one of those things where you withhold information to try and identify the killer?”

Terezi felt a small flutter of pride. Cathy had learned that watching cop shows with her.

“No,” George told them, his voice still stern as he watched Matt. “It's to try and prevent a panic.”

Matt snorted. “Half the street saw the bodies, and the blood. Tabloids probably have pictures printing right now. The secret's out already.”

“I, I don't understand,” Tavros said, shrinking back a little as the attention of the table focused on him. “Why, uh, why would there be, um, panic? More than, um, there already is,” he added, staring resolutely at his plate. There was an awkward silence, into which Terezi began cackling.

“Because they think it's a troll,” she said. The adults looked more uncomfortable, and her grin widened. “I'm right, aren't I? They think it's a troll, and now a human's dead this is suddenly a cullfest waiting to happen.”

“That is not going to happen,” George said sternly. Matt let out a harsh bark of laughter.

“Yeah, sure. Like we don't have enough problems with the damn purists already,” he said, reaching across the table for the chicken platter. “They are gonna lose it over this one.”

“But why would you think it's an Alternian?” Susan asked, brow furrowed as she played with the food on her plate. “I mean surely if the victims were all nonhuman until recently, you would suspect a human supremacist?”

There was another awkward pause, then George shook his head. “We did consider that near the beginning, and it hasn't been ruled out, but our criminal profile suggests a less... stable motivation for the killings.”

“We're looking for a complete whack-job,” Matt interjected, mouth full. Cathy glared at him and he swallowed, unrepentant.

“And Alternians are in general significantly stronger than humans. Since some of the victims were notably strong even for Alternians, it seems most likely that an Alternian is responsible,” George continued, ignoring his partner's straits. “Almost certainly one with blue or purple chroma.”

“Highbloods,” Tavros muttered. Terezi felt her blood boil a little at the thought, remembering another time when the blood of the innocent had stained walls, and justice had been the sharpened end of a smooth white cane.

“We don't use that language in this house, Tavros,” Susan chided- but gently. Terezi found herself wondering if the humans really believed that generations of domination and subjugation could really be redressed by changing the words used to describe it.

“So is it escalation?” she asked the suddenly silent table. Terezi had learned the new context for the word from her police shows, and she had hoped ever since that it would come in useful one day. For a moment, she sensed the two cops silently trying to pass each other the buck. Matt lost, and rose to the occasion with an answer.

“At the moment it looks more like the human was just in the wrong place at the wrong time, but I'm not sure I'd bet money on it. I've seen some messed up stuff in my time, but this guy takes the cake. How he hasn't given himself away yet is the biggest mystery of the case.”

“What does that mean?” Buck asked suddenly. He sounded no less sullen than usual, but Terezi felt her heart jump a little at his participation. Looked like the kid was warming up; good for him.

“He is hardly a neat or speedy killer,” George explained to his son. “He doesn't seem to pick his victims in advance or prepare at all, and yet nobody sees him leave the crime scenes although he would have to be drenched in blood.”

“George!” Susan objected. “Do you really think we should be saying this in front of the children?”

“But Mom, I want to hear!” Emily protested. When all the attention shifted to her, she shuffled in her seat. “If we don't attempt to understand the minds of the guilty, how can we ever hope to recognize them?” she asked, stubbornness flushing her cheeks a tasty peach pink. Terezi flushed too, hiding a smile. She hadn't realized how much the younger girl had been absorbing from her.

Susan opened her mouth incredulously, but George beat her to it. “All the same, I think your mother is right. That is quite enough discussion of this for one mealtime.”

And that was that. The conversation faded back into ordinary mundanities until the food was all eaten and the mealtime blessing customary to this human household said. As they were clearing the plates from the table, the phone rang and George answered. After a moment he called Matt into the room on “police business”, leaving Susan and Cathy with the clean-up as the children absconded upstairs. Terezi waited until they reached Tavros' room then paused at the door. Tavros and Emily watched her with interest.

“What is it?” Emily asked for them both. Terezi raised a finger to her lips, shooshing them.

“I have an investigation to pursue,” she told them, tiptoeing back to the top of the stairs. She crept back down to the bottom, then paused and turned her head back when she heard someone else step onto the stairwell. The smell behind her was undoubtedly the older human Francisco sibling.

“What are you doing?” she hissed. Buck grinned as he joined her crouching on the bottom step.

“I want to know whatever it is you're eavesdropping on,” he whispered back. Terezi glared at him but he just crouched there defiantly. Carefully she put a finger to her lips, and he nodded. Hardly reassured but with no better choice she put her head as close to the corner as was safe and focused her hearing on what was happening in the living room.

“... ... ... something's up ... we leave,” she heard Matt say in unusually quiet tones. “Terezi ... ... ....”

“... ... be there,” George replied, his voice equally soft. “... ... ... biggest break ... ... ... weeks. ... ... living witness ....”

Well. That was certainly interesting. Terezi pulled back around the corner and with a not insignificant amount of arm flailing managed to convince Buck to retreat back up the stairs. She followed him, a thoughtful frown on her face as she wondered who the witness might be, and what exactly they might know about the Ringmaster.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh, wow, I have kudos and comments (stating the obvious, but it makes me happy)!
> 
> So anyways, I decided to be nice and double-post this week. In future I should be posting two chapters a week outside of unforseen circumstances. I can pretty much guarantee this because I already have the whole thing written, I just have to edit before posting.
> 
> Why would I post so slowly if it's already written, I hear you cry? Because I'm working on writing something else and I thought people might appreciate a slower posting schedule with a smaller gap to the next thing, is why. I'm not gonna start posting anything that doesn't have an ending because, well, that way you're not going to get into something that is suddenly never going to finish.
> 
> To the people who read this, and especially to the ones who came back to read more; I LOVE YOU. Anonymous validation makes me all warm and fuzzy inside.
> 
> See you next week! ^_^


	5. ==> Be The Concerned STRONG Blueblood

### CHAPTER FOUR ==> Be The Concerned STRONG Blueblood

Equius Zahhak was beginning to get worried. While it was normal for his moirail to spend copious amounts of time exploring the city alone, she would usually contact him regularly throughout the day to reassure him of her well-being. However, it was now approaching nearly twenty-four hours since he had last seen her and no such communications had been forthcoming. He had of course covered for her absence at breakfast, telling Antonio that she had slept in her bed (and sweating profusely at the sheer unflinching falsehood) with every intention of chiding her for her negligence. But he had not had the chance; Nepeta had not contacted him in her customary fashion at all, nor had she responded to any of his earlier texts or calls.

He had reasoned that she had most likely turned her phone off in order to stalk some interesting individual, or else had lost it and would be suitably repentant when he scolded her for her carelessness. He had spent a good deal of time attempting to persuade himself of these likely scenarios before accidentally breaking one of the kitchen chairs in his distress. After the flimsy plastic seat was properly disposed of, he had excused himself from the house and taken a public bus downtown. After a short but _colorful_ journey he had alighted from the vehicle and continued on foot to the Nine Dragon Dojo, breathing a heavy sigh of relief as he stepped out of the filthy, crowded streets of the human city into the peaceful interior of the low rectangular building.

It would not have been an exaggeration to say that the shabby, ugly little building was Equius' haven from a world that seemed intent on tearing down everything he had ever held dear. It was not easy, being so naturally strong on a planet inhabited by beings so fragile. Even on Alternia, a far more resilient place, he had found the world too flimsy for his abnormal strength. Everything he had touched was damaged or destroyed, and even his tough and honorable lusus Aurthour had bruised at the gentlest of his caresses. The greatest mockery of all had been that he was too strong even to draw a bow without breaking it, thus barring him from the noble sport of archery- the legacy of his bloodline and once the deepest desire of his heart.

Nepeta had been the only thing he never feared to break, because she herself had never feared it. His tiny, wild, beautiful moirail would climb all over him with abandon and never once think that he might harm her, and he for his part never did. It was heartbreaking how such a wonderful child could be so poorly raised. It took his breath away that one of her decent midblooded station could be so uncouth, so unmannerly, so dangerously close to feral. He had done his best to educate her but she had no interest in propriety or proper behavior. She had said as much in plain words the day she had begged him to leave Alternia.

“It's Gamzee,” she had told him, eyes huge and wide as she clung sharp-clawed to his chest. “The cheerful clown is leaving on the ship because he doesn't want to get meowdered by the culling drones, and the cunning huntress thinks that he will purrobably get in trouble if she and her noble musclebeast meowrail don't go with him!”

Equius had barely considered her words before answering. “Whilst I agree that we should in general assist the Highblood, this plan to leave Alternia is treasonous and does not befit his stature. We should convince him to abandon his foolish attempt to lose himself amongst the lowbloods and help him here, where he belongs.”

He could never forget how Nepeta had pouted at him then. “And what about the adventurous kitty?” she had demanded. “What about me, Equius? What if I want to purrsue a life away from Alternia? What if I find it impawsible to resist the idea of meowndering through the stars on the journey of a lifetime?”

He had tried to talk her out of it, of course, and she had screamed at him in hurt and fury, and they had not spoken for a week. By the end of that time Equius had been deeply regretting his folly. He had talked to the Highblood over Trollian and heard Gamzee's reasons for wishing to abscond, and as much as he hated to admit it they were sound- which of course only made Nepeta's arguments equally valid. So he had returned to her and agreed that they would leave together on the ship, and she had embraced him and his world had once again had its center.

Despite being the most reluctant traveler he had ended up being the one to organize their small band. As unforgivable as it was to even think given their relative stations, Gamzee was incapable of remembering what he was doing from moment to moment, let alone making practical plans. As for Nepeta, she spent the season of waiting fluctuating between irrepressible excitement and bottomless misery, torn between joy at the great adventure to come and the sorrow of parting from her beloved lusus. Equius, for his part, had felt the strangest sense of relief at leaving loyal Aurthour to fend for himself. It was in a way a kindness to release his lusus from service, although it should not have been, and in some small fashion he too had begun to look forward to their departure.

There was no time to regret his decision until they were all already aboard the ship and it was too late to turn back. Then there was nothing but time for regret. He had tried to protect his moirail and the Highblood, done his best to keep them all away from the lewd, degenerate lowbloods that infested the ship and squabbled over worthless scraps. He had failed spectacularly when Gamzee somehow managed to find and befriend a specimen that not only habitually spouted the most filthy language conceivable, but had blood so low it had fallen off the hemospectrum altogether. Worse yet, Nepeta had been utterly enchanted by the disgusting creature to the point where he had suspected she might have a flush-crush on it. Equius had tolerated the thing's presence as amicably as he could manage, but it had been a difficult task and before long he had been harboring a deep personal dislike for Karkat Vantas. He had thought nothing could change that opinion. Sometimes he still wished that he had been right.

Things had changed irrevocably for the four of them on the Night of Blood. For Equius the first news of the spreading massacre had been an exercise in fear- not for himself, because he had foolishly believed he was strong enough to protect himself, but for his more fragile moirail. Nowhere on the ship had been safe, so he had kept her at his side and tried to stay away from the bloodthirsty mobs and the undisciplined highbloods who stalked the corridors in a killing frenzy. It was their right, of course, their nature and their purpose, but to see it happen and bear witness to the carnage made it all seem much less simple than it truly was. Equius had tried not to think about it, but then they had entered a narrow maintenance corridor in the hope of hiding themselves and they had found Gamzee.

The Highblood was sober, and he was commanding, and he was deadly- everything Equius had ever wanted him to be and so much more. He had stood with his bloody weapons in hand and he had told Equius to kneel, and Equius had done it. Never mind that his moirail was still beside him. Never mind that the Highblood would cull them both. He had knelt in the puddles of gore that already stained the floor and he had cried blue tears and he had not moved, not an inch. Not when Gamzee had advanced on him, clubs twirling. Not when Nepeta had leapt in front of him and carved three deep scratches into the Highblood's face. Not when Gamzee had knocked the girl he had once called his sweet little kitty sis cruelly aside and left her bleeding on the floor.

Equius hadn't moved when Karkat had approached slowly from the other direction and wrapped his arms around the psychotic indigo-blood. He hadn't moved when the pair of them had sunk to the ground together in a cloud of soft paps and whispered shooshes. He hadn't moved when Karkat had slowly and carefully left Gamzee's side, to check that Nepeta was still alive and Equius was still breathing. He had just kept kneeling in a pool of mixed colors, ignoring the headless bodies and the bodiless heads that adorned their little refuge, while Nepeta crawled slowly over to him and wrapped herself around his waist and Karkat pulled Gamzee over to a wall and clung to him like he was drowning. They had still been there hours or maybe days later, when the rescue teams found them. They had asked about the bodies and the blood, casting suspicious glances at the two highbloods. Karkat had sworn blind that it was none of them, that they had found the place defiled like that before they had hidden there. Equius had nodded his assent to the lies and much, much later he had repeated them. It had not sounded particularly convincing to him but nobody questioned the story. He had heard other tales that seemed equally unlikely from others placed highly in the hemospectrum and a large part of him wished he had been able to believe them.

It had been easy to avoid Gamzee and Karkat after that night. There was never a discussion or a disagreement; they simply vanished and Equius had welcomed their absence. He never mentioned them again and neither did Nepeta, save for a few slips of the tongue that were soon forgotten. He and his moirail had done their best to stay away from others after that night, burying themselves in the forgotten corners of the ship and emerging only to collect food and water rations from the ship's crew, whose small numbers had begun to patrol the main thoroughfares regularly and in watchful force. The rest of the journey dragged on, slow and endless and empty of purpose until its unscheduled ending brought relief of a sort. Equius had watched with awe how regally the Heiress had handled herself in front of the aliens, but his admiration was undercut with fear. The strange blunt-edged creatures, so like and so unlike trolls, were an unknown quantity. Propriety had no guidelines for dealing with them, and like Vantas their blood somehow avoided the hemospectrum altogether, leaving Equius adrift and without the surety of appropriate behavior to fall back on.

There was also Nepeta to consider, for his unusual strength forced the pair of them to stay in Quarantine far longer than most. He had watched other trolls leave by the dozen, while around him the humans moved warily and answered in nervous half-truths for fear of causing offense. They had offered Nepeta the chance to leave without him, but she had turned them down, and even in his weariness he was glad she had stayed by his side. It had not taken long to realize that those who were left were the ones who lacked control and were by human standards dangerous to themselves or others- lowbloods who could not rein in their psychic outbursts, seadwellers who panicked helplessly when out of water, midbloods who were feral enough to bite and claw without warning- and Equius, too powerful to control his strength and too angry to want to.

He had only seen the latter part of the problem with the help of Doctor Lewis, a human man who had started to visit him shortly after he had been moved to the special Quarantine. The man had come to see him in the small and featureless room that he had been assigned, a temporary construction whose flimsy walls were already patched and scarred from Equius' accidents. From the beginning he had acted differently, noting the damage but not flinching from it, and he had sat calmly on the chair opposite Equius' seat on the narrow bed before attempting to explain his presence. His words had been extremely confusing. At first he had described himself as a healer, but did not leave when Equius informed him that there were no injuries for him to treat. After some further explanation Equius had come to understand that the human was some sort of professional moirail, a concept so lewd and bizarre that he had asked several more questions to make sure his impression was correct. Equius had then promptly informed the human that Nepeta was already filling that quadrant with him and requested that the man leave. The human had done just that, with impressive subservience, but not before promising to return later. Equius had wondered at the time why the man was so determined to invade his pale romance.

Then the man had kept his word, and when he came back he had done so with Nepeta in tow. He had returned to his seat on the chair and looked at them both, side by side on the bed, and explained that he had no wish or intention to harm their relationship. On the contrary, he would try to teach them both how to help each other better. Nepeta had bristled at that, and Equius too had been less than calm. How dare this stranger, this alien, assume he knew better than they how to care for each other! But he had apologized for his words and asked with gratifying humility that they attempt to humor him, at least for a while. With little else to occupy their time and the very real concern of never leaving Quarantine in their minds, they had agreed. At first the human had taken care to meet with them both together whenever they spoke, and soon it had been Equius and Nepeta who did most of the speaking. The Doctor had asked them questions about their life on Alternia and on the ship, about their relationship with each other and with others. The man had never dug too deep, never asked too much, and bitter though it was to remember the good times it was a relief to have someone to tell the stories to. Slowly they had both begun to trust him, and when he had asked permission to speak to each of them alone they had hesitantly agreed.

Individually, they had both revealed more than they would ever have expected to tell a human. They still maintained some deceptions, of course- best that their new world not know too much about the Empire and its hungry claws, or how it had been their friend Gamzee and not some nameless highblood who had hurt them on the ship, or how dependent they had all been on the sopor slime and how quickly things had fallen apart without it. Later, Equius learned from his moirail that Doctor Lewis had spoken with her about her freedom on Alternia and how she felt about losing it, and how deeply the loss of her lusus and her friends had hurt her. He had felt shame that his moirail had not felt able to confide these things in him until the advice of an outsider said otherwise- and yet he had understood, because when he spoke to the Doctor he talked of things that he would never have told his beloved Nepeta for fear of causing her pain and worry. Under the constant yet gentle questioning of the human he had revealed things even he had not truly realized about himself. He had known of his firm belief in the rightness of the hemospectrum, and on some level had even been aware of how that conviction had been shaken by his experiences, but until Doctor Lewis had drawn the words from him he had never considered that his need for a clear hierarchy could be born of a fear of losing control. Until he heard himself freely confess it, he had not once thought that he could be ashamed of his own obedience, embarrassed by his own commands, afraid that he was worthless without the trappings of nobility that he had once drawn so close around himself. His conversations with Doctor Lewis were usually followed by conversations with his moirail, both of them letting spill things they had never before thought of themselves and learning that the other had somehow known all along. It was strange how comforting it was to admit just how lost he had become, and how much better it felt to realize he was not alone in his confusion.

Slowly Equius had learned to keep his temper, if not always his strength, in check. His conversations with the Doctor began to run dry as he learned all the secrets he had kept from himself and came to terms with them. One by one the remaining trolls had left Quarantine after similar discussions with the strange humans who had somehow made it their life's work to offer pale pity and patch broken minds into functioning wholes. Then the day had come when Doctor Lewis had come to them with another human, this one an administrator, who had curtly told them that they too were being released. The Doctor had offered them a small card and told them to make contact if they ever needed his services again, but let them know that in his opinion it was unlikely they would.

“You have both made excellent progress,” he had told them, smiling with what could only have been pride. “As long as you remember to communicate with each other, you should be able to face whatever comes your way.”

Nepeta had hugged their Doctor tightly and Equius had given the man an awkward bow, still too afraid of causing injury to follow the human custom of shaking hands. As they had gathered their belongings and prepared to leave he had recognized the empty feeling in his stomach and wondered if he would ever stop feeling as if he had been cast adrift. Then Nepeta had squeezed his hand and he had realized that he was not the only one afraid to move onwards, which somehow made it easier to do just that.

Their new home was a communal living space, intended originally and primarily for young humans with behavioral issues who lacked a dedicated caretaker. There were several adult humans whose profession was to act as lusii for their charges, but Equius had soon realized that their numbers were too few to properly manage the unruly inhabitants of Prospit House. He and Nepeta had been moved into a small room with two beds, two wardrobes and two bedside tables, and the young human woman named Paige Miller had shown them around the house and told them the rules. There were a lot of rules, most of which seemed intended to restrict access to potential weapons or reduce the grounds for a disagreement. It had not been long before Equius had realized why. The human youngsters who lived in the house did not simply have loose morals, they had none whatsoever. They screamed when defied and attacked when they should submit. Some reacted badly to seemingly harmless words or images, while others were so docile they failed to respond even to the most dramatic of events. The most disturbing were the ones who were always smiling and the ones who simply did not know how to stop being angry, because in their lewd language and improper behavior Equius found himself remembering his erstwhile friends, wondering if they were faring well and regretting his lack of contact with them.

It had not taken long for Equius to fall into a routine at the house. As one of the oldest and most responsible he was soon trusted to watch the younger children, leaving the four adult carers free to monitor the other teens. He took his duty seriously, of course, but when things became unruly he would call for Antonio or Wanda rather than intervening himself. After one accident involving an aggressive overture from one of the older boys and a compound arm fracture, Equius did not trust himself to refrain from harming others. Without ever touching his charges, he also helped shepherd them to school and guide them home. He found human school to be a chaotic place and learning to be all but impossible in the undisciplined environment, but he tried hard and listened to his new teachers as best he could. Sometimes other humans would attempt to taunt or harm his charges, and he grew used to interposing himself between the victim and the tormentor. It was after all his duty to keep the small ones safe, and fulfilling that purpose felt good in the void that had become his life.

Nepeta would help him when she could, but more often she was out exploring the world they had landed on. At Equius' insistence she attended school and returned to the house to sleep each night, but the rest of the time she preferred to prowl the streets and rooftops of LA alone. She missed most of the house meals and Equius saved food for her, leaving it on her pillow and finding her asleep atop the covers in the morning. The carers, in particular Warren and Paige, had worried about her at first. Equius had assured them that she had lived far wilder on Alternia and would come to no harm on Earth. In the end they had more immediate concerns and so they relied on him to ensure her well-being, another duty that he shouldered without complaint.

When he found the time he too would go exploring, not seeking adventure as his moirail did but rather searching for something he could not quite put a name to. He found it late one Saturday afternoon in a strange neighborhood where the shop signs were written in symbols he could not read and the lampposts were inexplicably painted a vibrant red. A crowd of people in strange white clothing were entering a long, low building, but what really drew Equius' eye were their belts. They each wore a colored strip around their middle, the only difference in their otherwise uniform appearance, and it was so clearly a mark of rank that Equius found himself following them in, curious to know what they were doing.

Inside, the building had an odd padded floor and low wooden benches along the walls, the white-painted concrete of the structure lit by high, narrow windows and orange strip lights. The humans had given Equius a few strange looks as he slipped onto one of the seats, and then one who was clad all in black had come to ask him if he was there to join the lesson. He had shaken his head and tried to explain that he was simply curious and would like to sit and watch a while. The black-clad human had nodded as if this was the most normal thing in the world, then gone to the other end of the room and clapped his hands. The other humans had promptly organized themselves into rows facing him, clustered according to their belt colors, and bowed. Equius had felt himself begin to sweat a little at the sight, a problem which only grew worse as they warmed up and began a series of unarmed combat exercises. He knew that he should not have been there, that he was intruding on their training, and yet he couldn't bring himself to leave.

The lesson lasted for a couple of hours and when it was over the black-clad human approached him again, to ask if he would like to train with them next time. Equius, shaking a little, had declined. The human had seemed a little disappointed, so Equius had explained that it was not safe, that with his strength he would likely severely injure or kill anyone he trained with. The human had nodded in understanding and with a little regret, and suggested that perhaps Equius would like to come and observe again.

Equius had said that he would like that very much.

The human had given him the date and time of their next training session and the class had left. Equius had sat there alone in the room for a while before slowly heading back to the house, cradling the order and peace of the strange training building to him like a warm glow before he found himself back in the chaos and discord of ordinary life.

When he went back the next week he was so eager that he arrived half an hour early, and was surprised to see a different class with different colored belts leaving the building. Curious he made inquiries of their leader, who also wore black, and discovered that there were many classes teaching different “martial arts” making use of the training hall. He was shown the small locker room in the back where a cork-board displayed posters for all of the different classes, and thanking the humans he stood there and memorized as many as he could possibly attend.

After that Equius became a common sight at the Nine Dragon Dojo. Whenever his responsibilities did not require him to be elsewhere, he would head across town and sit at the back of the classes, listening to the teachings and watching the techniques. At some point or another, all of the teachers asked if he would like to join them, and one by one he turned them all down. Still he watched and learned. He learned the kicks of Tae Kwon Do and the throws of Judo, the grabs and holds of Ninpo Budo and the rapid strikes of Wing Chun, and why each of them used that approach. He learned where the slightest pressure would hurt or cripple, and he learned how a bad technique would damage the person performing it more than their target. He learned about the power of breath and the flow of energy in the body, although it was called by different names, and he learned words for rolls and numbers and stances in the tongues of lands he had never heard of before. He learned how the smallest and weakest warrior could defeat the strongest and mightiest with the right knowledge and skills. He learned a dozen different colorful ranking systems, and secretly thought how appropriate it was to the skill involved that each and every one was achieved through knowledge and merit rather than through birth.

Sometimes, when the dojo was empty, he had tried to copy the smooth, forceful movements he had seen and stopped immediately when he felt impossibly halting and clumsy. He always took great care never to break anything in the hall, but that never stopped the fear that one day he might. The thought that the humans might tire of his presence and bar him from entry made him go to the greatest lengths to be careful and courteous in every action.

One Monday evening after the last class had left, Equius had been attempting to reproduce some of their formal patterns without success when he became aware of someone watching him. He had stopped and turned to see a small aged human man watching him from the doorway, and in embarrassment Equius had let his shoulders slump as he backed away.

“I apologize,” he had said. “I did not realize anyone else would be here.”

“Why did you stop?” the man asked, walking into the hall. He had carried a sports bag over one shoulder, but rather than the usual martial arts outfit (a dobok or a gi or whatever other name it had been given by the country that had created the form) he wore a loose t-shirt and jogging bottoms. Equius frowned, wondering what the stranger was doing at the dojo.

“I did not wish to hurt you,” he explained. The man had laughed sharply, nothing but joy in his expression as he watched Equius with sharp brown eyes.

“Hah! You are too clumsy to hurt a kitten, boy.” He walked to one of the benches and dumped his bag on it. “If you plan to be in my class, you will have to try harder than that.”

Equius had flushed. “I assure you, I am not here to join any class,” he had insisted through gritted, broken fangs. “I am exceedingly strong, and I have no desire to cause injury to anyone.”

“And yet you sit in the back of this dojo day after day, watching like a hawk watches a mouse,” the old human said. He had grinned at Equius' surprised expression. “Oh yes, I have heard of you, boy. When I first arranged to teach here they told me about the strong troll who watches and listens and never, ever dares to do more. They said I should simply let you be.”

“They were right,” Equius had replied, circling to avoid the disconcerting advance of the small human. “Please. I do not wish to do you harm.” Surely his broken horn and perpetually cracked sunglasses were enough visible testament to his uncontrollable strength- but the strange human never so much as blinked when he looked Equius appraisingly up and down.

“Hold out your hand!” the old man snapped and before he could register what he was doing Equius had obeyed. The human reached out and Equius froze, paralyzed with fear as the man gently touched his own palm to Equius' own. Pale brown skin met gray in a feather-light touch that lasted for several agonizing seconds before the old human withdrew, a broad smile on his face.

“Strange. You don't seem to have hurt me at all,” he had mused, turning his hand and looking at it from all angles. Equius had let out the breath he had been holding and shook with relief, blue sweat pouring off his face. The old man then pointed to a spot in the middle of the floor. “Stand there.” When Equius had obeyed, the human took up a stance and paused expectantly. Slowly, hesitantly, Equius had taken the same position.

His blood pusher had frozen again as the old man dropped his stance and walked over. Gentle hands adjusted his position, bending an elbow, straightening a shoulder. “Relax,” the old man told him firmly. “You are too tense. Imagine there is a string here”- he reached up and tapped the crown of Equius' head- “from which you are suspended like a wooden doll.”

As the old man backed away once more, Equius had slowly followed his advice. It was difficult to simultaneously relax and yet keep his limbs in such precise alignment, but somehow he found the trick of it. The old man had nodded once then resumed the stance himself before starting to move. His motions were slower and more fluid than any Equius had seen in the dojo, more like a dance than a combat form, and his clumsy attempts to follow seemed crass and ugly by comparison. After a few brief steps the man stopped and got him to go through it again, advising him on how to shift his stance and his arms and reminding him to relax, always relax. Occasionally he darted in to physically move something, causing Equius to freeze in panic. They went over the steps again and again, and by the time the next student arrived half an hour later Equius had memorized the sequence and was almost graceful in repeating it.

The lesson had lasted for two hours and was nothing like the others he had witnessed. None of the half-dozen students who eventually arrived wore belts, and all of them dressed in loose, ordinary clothes. There were no orderly rows, no clear rankings or neat divisions of learning. Yet as they arrived and greeted their instructor, he had set each of them to a task- some together, some alone- and walked between them offering guidance and instruction as necessary. Equius he had kept going through the steps of a form, adding a few more stages each time he passed by. In the opposite corner of the dojo in an equal band of space, Equius had seen another student doing the same. For a while he had paused and watched as the human moved in a stately dance, the pattern going on and on, long past the point where another art would have finished and growing more complex as it went. Then the teacher had returned to him and he belatedly began again, focusing even harder on keeping his motions slow and smooth. It was harder than he could have imagined to keep that level of control over his body, and he felt himself begin to sweat profusely with the unexpected effort.

When the class finished, the students had waited for him as they replaced their shoes. Equius had paused, uncertain, and the instructor had looked at him with a smile.

“I am Sifu Leung,” he had told Equius. “My next class will begin at eight o'clock on Wednesday. I hope you will attend.” And then they had gone, leaving Equius alone in the dojo until he realized that curfew had been an hour ago and he still had to make his way back to the house.

After explanations and recriminations he had gained permission to go to the next class, and the next, and although he still watched the other training sessions he now spent the time between them practicing for his Sifu. He learned that the art he had somehow begun to learn was called Tai Chi, that it was famed for its health benefits more than its combat application, and that none of the students in his class wore belts because their Sifu believed that he and they should know what each person was capable of without the need for such impersonal and general divisions.

Sifu said a lot of things that made sense to Equius, about strength and power and control and balance and grace. He talked to his students and learned about their lives, and Equius learned too about their jobs and their friends and their hopes and their loves. When he chose to share a little more of himself and Sifu had heard about Nepeta, the old teacher had grown very interested in the concept of moirails and asked to meet her. After one disastrous class where a mortified Equius was certain his pale quadrant was going to get them both exiled for life from the dojo, Sifu had thrown his head back and laughed before explaining the concept of Yin and Yang anew to his bemused students. Nepeta had never set foot in the dojo again, but Sifu often asked Equius about his “little Wildcat” and took as much interest in her as he did in any of his students, always smiling at her when she came to hover outside the dojo waiting for Equius to emerge and playing along with her stalking, pouncing feline games.

“She is the other half of your self,” was the only explanation he would offer, and Equius thought he understood a little. He had never met another person quite like Sifu, human or troll, yet under the old man's tutelage he found that slowly his strength came more and more under his control. Gradually he broke fewer and fewer things and although he still did not dare to touch others, he became more comfortable with them touching him. For the first time since leaving Alternia, Equius felt as though there was solid ground under his feet.

Except that now, in the present, Nepeta was missing and that same ground was spinning and pitching out of control. Despite his intention to let the practice soothe his shattered nerves, Equius was barely in the class for fifteen minutes before Sifu raised a hand to pause his form. With a firm but gentle grip the teacher led him into a corner of the dojo.

“You have a problem,” he said quietly, a question in the shape of a statement spoken too low for the other students to overhear. Equius stared fixedly at the floor just to the left of and behind the man's head.

“I am concerned about Nepeta,” he told Sifu, and explained her troubling disappearance. As he spoke, the man began to frown and his expression grew more sombre. When Equius was done, he tapped his lips thoughtfully with one wrinkled finger.

“You should return to your home,” he said, and raised a hand to silence Equius as he began to protest. “Your moirail could be in serious trouble. You must tell the truth to your guardians, and if they think it best you should contact the police. I expect they will want to do that as soon as possible.”

Equius squirmed. “I am sure she is fine?” he said, and winced when it came out more like a question than an assertion of fact. Sifu snorted.

“If you are sure, then why are you so worried?” he asked. Equius swallowed, nodded once, then without waiting for any further permission ran from the dojo.

It was late enough that it was starting to grow dark, and now that he had shared his fears and heard them reflected back to him Equius' blood pusher was starting to race. The bus arrived at the stop as he was at the far end of the road, and heedless of the humans around him he ran at full speed down the sidewalk and jumped aboard to the stunned stares of the other passengers. He clung to the metal bar overhead hard enough to leave finger-shaped indents as the bus began to move, his mind restlessly furnishing him with images of Nepeta hurt, Nepeta dead, Nepeta with her grass-green blood pooling around her, and it took every ounce of self-control he had learned in the last two years on Earth not to rip the bus apart in fury. At his stop he jumped off before the door had even fully opened and started to run again, barely aware of the people who jumped out of his way, desperate to reach Prospit House and terrified in knowing that it would not be the end of the matter. His feet left cracks in the tarmac as he pounded around the corner and then he froze in shock because by the rusted gate, curled against the outside of the chicken-wire fence, he could see the familiar long olive shirt and blue fleece hat of his moirail.

He slowed to approach her at a walk, and as he drew nearer he saw that she was curled into a tight ball, her shoulders shaking with quiet sobs. He felt sweat prickle his brow as he crouched down in front of her and softly said, “Nepeta?”

She unfolded like a jack-in-the-box, pouncing forward and knocking him flat on his back as she clung to his neck and mewled into his shoulder. Levering himself upright with one arm he wrapped the other carefully around her shoulders, relief that she was alive and intact balanced by growing concern over her distraught state. Gently he shifted to cradle her, shooshing softly and telling himself to be patient.

Gradually her sniffles and whimpering began to resolve into coherent words. “... I paw it, I meown I saw it, I... I was stalking the other man and I couldn't ssssee, the frightened kitten hid in the shadows where he couldn't see her but she couldn't see his face... I had to look, I had to purrove it wasn't... the pawctures, she saw the pawctures...”

As Equius tried to comfort his distraught moirail, he felt his cell buzz in his pocket. Annoyed at the intrusion he carefully extracted it, trying not to crush it as his finger moved to dismiss the call. Then he caught sight of the incoming caller ID and hesitated, because the name that flashed on the screen was Nepeta's. He glanced down at his moirail, curled up in his arms, and then back at the glowing screen, before cautiously accepting the call and putting the phone to his ear.

“Who is this?” he demanded. There was a pause, and he heard other people in the background over the line. Phones ringing, voices shouting, the unmistakable sounds of a room full of busy people.

“I was planning to ask you that,” said a man's voice, cutting through the clutter. It sounded amused and Equius felt his hand tremble with anger.

“I demand to know how you came by my moirail's cellphone,” he hissed. Nepeta looked up at him, eyes wide, and he wrapped his arm a little closer around her in reassurance.

This time the response was immediate and much more serious. “I'm Detective Matt Sikes of the LAPD, and we found your moirail's cell at a crime scene. Forensics just released it, and this number was marked as the emergency contact.” There was a brief pause, then the man continued. “I'm guessing that you and the owner of this phone are both trolls?” A second voice started saying something nearby that seemed to draw a response from the caller. “Yeah... yeah, I know... okay! Jeez!” The man sighed. “Sorry, I meant to say _Alternians_.”

The man could have been lying, but somehow Equius felt that an imposter would have been considerably more polished, and would not have used such a lewd false name as Sikes. Nevertheless he remained reserved as he replied, “You are correct in your guess, detective. My name is Equius Zahhak, and my moirail is called Nepeta Leijon.” There was no way to trace them from that information without access to sealed records. It was safe enough to share.

“Well, Mr... Zahhak,” the apparent detective said, “I have been called into work especially to talk to you, because we suspect your moirail witnessed a serious crime and we're worried that she could be in danger. Do you have any idea where she is?”

Equius looked down at Nepeta and frowned. “Yes. She is with me. Do you mind if I inquire as to what she may have witnessed?”

There was another long pause during which there seemed to be an argument. Equius waited in silent concern until the detective spoke again. “We think she might have seen the Ringmaster's killing last night,” he said simply.

Equius' whole body tensed and he felt Nepeta shiver in response. The thought of her even being close to that monster did not bear thinking about, and the realization that she could so easily have been the victim was lurking right in the front of his mind. He carefully kept his voice level as he replied. “I will bring her to the station right away.”

“If you let me know where you are, I can have a car sent over,” the detective offered and for a moment Equius considered it.

“No,” he said eventually. “I assure you I will deliver her safely.” He couldn't take the risk that it was an imposter on the other end of the line. It would not be too difficult to get her to the police station, and once there they would be safe. Before the man could argue, Equius hung up the call and tucked the phone back in his pocket. Carefully he stood up, lifting Nepeta in both arms and squaring his shoulders before he walked back to the house. There would certainly be a great deal of fuss and recrimination, which was no less than he deserved for his earlier deception and his terrible negligence, but he had no choice. He trusted Antonio or one of the other carers to drive them to the police station, which was more than he could say for anyone else at that moment in time.

His moirail, now quiet but no less distressed, dug her claws into his arms as he paused on the doorstep. He took a moment to whisper something reassuring, and wondered with a sick feeling in the pit of his stomach what nightmare she had managed to stumble into without him there to keep her safe.


	6. ==> Be The Despondent Amphibious Advisor

### CHAPTER FIVE ==> Be The Despondent Amphibious Advisor

Eridan Ampora hated Earth. He hated the night for being too dark and the daytime for being too bright. He couldn't stand the way the ocean tasted of piss and oil and he felt physically sick every time he saw one of the ridiculous hornless monkeys that passed for intelligent lifeforms on his new stinking homeworld. Right now though, what Eridan really hated more than anything else was human airplanes. They were small and they were flimsy and he could see the wings shaking! What kind of fucking ridiculous mode of travel spent the start and end of each journey _bouncing_ anyway?

The fact that this was a private jet with plush, comfortable seats, first-class service and excellent catering did not make his mood any better. It just meant another thing to be grateful to the Harley humans for, when it should have been his fucking birthright to be treated this way. He was a seadweller, cod damn it, among the highest nobility Alternia possessed. The humans should have been bowing down to kiss his feet, not disturbing his attempts to get some sleep by playing wiggler chase games up and down the aisle with a monstrous barkbeast.

As the insufferable cacophony once again thundered past his chair Eridan decided enough was enough. With a snarl he pulled the blindfold from his eyes and poked his head over the back of the seat to glare at the two girls, one human and one troll, who were trying and failing to wrestle the immense dog to the floor.

“Will you fuckin' stop it!” Eridan howled over their giggles. “Some of us are tryin' to avoid cripplin' jet-lag ower here!”

The wrestling paused as they turned to look at him, but the giggling did not. “Oh, shut up, jerkface!” Jade said, pushing her dark hair out of her stupid pink human face before turning back to fuss over Becquerel. Eridan responded with a hand gesture which approximately translated as “go and cull yourself with a rusty fork”. Looking back, he couldn't believe he had ever found her goofy flat teeth and crazy behavior attractive. At all.

“Eridan!” Feferi objected, lips pouting perfectly as she scolded him. “That's eely rude!”

“She started it,” he protested. Fef folded her arms and glared. Once that would have been enough to make him back off, but fuck her. She was the one who broke off their moirallegiance, and he didn't have to listen to a damn thing she said any more! Well, except for the fact that she was the Heiress, and also the only seadweller or even highblood to be considered a leader of their people on this planet, and also a lot better at understanding humans than him, but that was all beside the point which was that he could do what he liked and she could just glub on it.

In fact, he might just bring up a few points with her right now. “I don't know how you can do it Fef. Choosin' the humans ower your own people, it's fuckin' unconscionable.”

“Maybe it's because I'm not a creepy jackass,” Jade offered brightly.

Eridan sneered at the human girl. “I'm not just talkin' about you, you fuckin' landdwellin' peasant.”

“Oh, I'm a landdweller? When did you even last go near the water?” Jade asked, eyes narrowing.

“That's not the fuckin' point, I can't help it if your dumb species is always litterin' and pollutin' my natural habitat,” Eridan growled, claws digging into the fabric of the seat as he tightened his grip. He felt it give way in a few places and felt a vicious satisfaction at the damage.

“You didn't go into the water on Alternia much, either,” Fef said, smiling brightly and punctuating her words with a slight glub.

“Shut up!” Eridan yelled. “Look, all I'm tryin' to say if you'd listen is that it's stupid us ewen goin' to this party. The humans are gonna see we flew in to fuckin' kowtow to a bunch a stupid idiot purists and they aren't wery well goin' to respect us a whole lot after that, are they?” He huffed angrily, wrapping his arms on top of the seat and resting his chin on his crossed hands.

Fef frowned and sat on the floor, one hand idly scratching at Bec's white fur. “We're not koi-towing to the purists, Eridan,” she said. “It's a pro-integration fund-raiser; in theory everyone there already supports us!”

“If that's true then why are we ewen goin'?” he demanded. “Face it Fef, we're bein' trotted out like some sorta performin' circus to beg fawours off a the piss-poor excuse for nobility these humans got.” He turned back around and slumped in his seat. “I just don't think it's becomin' of our Heiress to be sellin' her dignity like that.”

There was a brief shuffling sound from the aisle, and then Fef and Jade sat down in the pair of seats opposite him. Eridan folded his arms and stared out of the small round window, refusing to acknowledge their presence.

“I know it's not ideal,” Fef said gently, reaching over to lay a hand on his knee. “But this is how these things are done here!” She smiled. “I actually kind of like the parties, too.”

“Yeah, all the important people have big fund-raisers,” Jade agreed, her smile just as bright as Fef's. “And being the guests of honor is really prestigious!”

Eridan sighed. “Tell me that again when the humans fuckin' decide we're actually people.” He didn't even turn to look at the girls, but knew he had hit home when Fef's hand left his knee. There was an uncomfortable silence, which he decided to fill with more uncomfortable truths. “If they don't respect us, there's no fuckin' way they're ewer gonna treat us proper.”

“I know,” Fef said with a worried glub. “Do you really think I could forget? I still think about that poor greenblood boy just after Quarantine- if the judge hadn't ruled that we count as humans under the law- and that precedent only counts in California, and it could still be overturned!” She paused, twisting her fingers in her lap. “That's why this fund-raiser is so important,” she said, and Eridan could hear the fire behind her words. “We have to make them see that we're not monsters or invaders, that we're people like them, and for that we need the money and we need the good publicity!” Her hand grabbed Eridan's and without meaning to he met her eyes, flecks of Tyrian purple standing out against the juvenile gray of her iris. “Will you please help me?”

His breath caught in his throat, his stuttering vascular system reminding him just how much he could pity this girl whether she wanted him to or not. Without even really thinking about it he said, “Don't I always?”

She smiled sadly and he did too, both of them remembering a time sweeps ago when they had still been moirails and she had come to him in tears, panicking and bleeding and desperate because she had just been attacked by assassins and had no idea what to do. It had been Eridan who had helped her work out that the Condesce had sent them, and Eridan who had helped to move her somewhere safer and more hidden. He had of course always done his best to protect her, but from that point on he had redoubled his efforts. He had been deeply hurt to learn, seasons later, about the escape plan she had been hatching. He had never dared to ask, but strongly suspected that if she hadn't needed his help so badly he would have known nothing until the ship had already left Alternia- and him- far behind. Looking back, it was one of the first clear signs that their relationship was disintegrating. If he had known then what he knew now, he wasn't sure he would have gone through with his part of the plan. As it was he still thought it was the most insane thing he had ever considered in his life.

He had to have been completely out of his fucking mind to ever agree to kill Gl'bgolyb.

Put aside for a moment the fact that it was several square miles of lethal tentacled hunger and death. Forget that it could conceivably have killed every troll in the universe just by raising its psychic voice. The important point was that it was Fef's lusus, and she loved it. Even when she was standing in front of him begging him to kill it, explaining that there was no way she could leave it behind without a caretaker, knowing that the Condesce would find a way to use it against them, she loved it. There was no way she could ever forgive him for succeeding in the task she had given him, even if she had picked him up from the ocean floor and patched his wounds and thanked him through sobs and glubs and tears as he slowly healed. To Eridan's mind, that was the reason he had lost her. Well, that and the pissblooded mutant freak's interference, but that was a separate issue entirely.

She had broken up with him by the time the ship was ready to leave, but by then he didn't have much choice other than to go. A ship had been stolen, half a million young trolls were running and the Heiress was attempting to escape her ordained death. Whether they succeeded or not someone was going to be culled for the mess, and Eridan did not want to be around to act as the Condesce's scapegoat. It had still been horrible, perigees and seasons of living like an unwanted ghost on a ship that rattled blindly along to nowhere. Eridan had nowhere better to be than at Fef's side, and watching her with that fucking lowblood Helmsman made his blood boil and his vascular valves ache. Kan had helped when she could, but usually she too was busy and Eridan didn't want her pitiless meddling anyway. Sometimes they had given him things to do, jobs they didn't have time for. Scraps of attention, sops to his pride, and he knew it.

When the sopor slime ran out he couldn't handle the rejection and the anger any more. He had kept just enough presence of mind to get himself away from Fef and Kan, not trusting himself anywhere near them with the rage and despair bubbling unbidden from his bile sac. As for the rest... he didn't really remember. He had come to on the floor in a makeshift medical area, his head bandaged and the rest of him covered in other people's blood. In the sweeps since he had sometimes- when it was really late, everyone else was asleep, and he was sure he was alone anyway- prayed that the blood had got there from self defense or falling over or anything, any reason at all, other than the obvious. That at least some of the things that everyone was suddenly pretending to believe could really be true. Not that it was his fault if anything had happened, not really. What else did they expect? He was a seadweller, of noble fucking lineage, and they had treated him like an irritating wiggler. It was only natural for him to cull some fucking lowbloods to blow off steam.

After that they had watched him more closely, given him more administrative tasks to keep him busy and let him deal with the increasing number of things that they didn't want to face. There had been so much work to do after the Night of Blood that they didn't have much choice other than to trust him anyway. The crew had always lacked the numbers to keep order on the ship; if they hadn't had such firm control of the few resources everyone needed, Fef's leadership wouldn't have lasted a single perigee, let alone more than a sweep. Eridan had made sure it kept going by recruiting more trolls for the ship's crew, trading desperately in favors and fear to build their numbers to the point where they could at least pretend to protect the safety of the survivors. Somehow the bluff of power had worked and kept working for the next half a sweep, carefully maintained by whatever underhanded tactics Eridan had to use to keep his friends safe and in charge. By the time they crashed on Earth- because that fucking pity-snatching mutant retard had fallen asleep while they were supposed to be landing- he was indispensable. Fef and Kan had insisted on dragging him through the accelerated Quarantine, and his loyal service had been more than enough for him to end up living with the same human as the Heiress.

There had been any number of reasons why they had ended up living with Harley. He was rich, he was respected, he was not politically affiliated to any major human groups, and most importantly he owned a small private island. The isolation and proximity to the ocean suited the two seadwellers very well indeed and provided a final deciding factor in the division of the leadership's living arrangements. Naturally Harley had his own reasons for adopting two leaders of the Alternian community on Earth, but those motivations that Eridan had uncovered were fairly benign. The man claimed to be a philanthropist, a human word meaning someone who threw their personal resources at problems that would be better solved by mass cullings, but Eridan suspected his genuine reasons had more to do with building a personal relationship between his human familial dynasty and troll royalty. Certainly Jade had ingratiated herself with the pair of them with an enthusiasm bordering on the obscene, and by offering to act as their lusus Harley had worked himself into a position of power as an adviser and mediator between the trolls and the humans.

There were no similarly clear reasons to explain why Harley had adopted Jade thirteen years ago in the first place, but Eridan assumed that to be related to the human obsession with raising wigglers to act as inheritors rather than waiting for a proper Descendant to come along like sensible and decent beings. Fef had spent more time talking to the humans and was insistent that there was more to it than that, but Eridan had stopped listening when she had started trying to describe the human “family” concept as being like a different type of romance. He had spent enough time trying to fill various quadrants to know that Fef didn't know what the hell she was glubbing on about there.

And as for that cod-damned barkbeast! It had apparently been Jade's beloved friend and protector since coming into existence as a tiny fluffy puppy some eight years previous, was allegedly the direct genetic ancestor of several litters of enormous white furry horrorterrors, and was named after a rather ragged toy bunny she had possessed since before adoption and eventually sent as a gift to her twin brother John, who had tracked her down over the internet seven years ago. All of which constituted more information than Eridan had ever actually wanted to know about the giant shaggy slobbermonster. It didn't like him, he was sure of it. It had never actually bitten him and it never growled or snarled in his direction. In fact it never acknowledged his existence at all in any way ever. It seemed to prefer to pretend it was living in a universe in which Eridan did not exist, which was absolutely fine because the feeling was deeply mutual.

He favored the creature with a baleful glare, which it predictably reacted to in no way whatsoever. To be honest, he wasn't even sure it could see anything what with all the heavy white fur over its eyes. Jade noticed him looking and scowled.

“Leave him alone,” she demanded. Eridan looked back at her face, small white-and-green human eyes concealing the disgusting bright red blood that flowed in her veins, and frowned right back.

“Why?” he asked, as haughty as he had ever been to a lowblood on Alternia. “You scared I'm goin' to hurt your stupid lusus surrogate?”

“He's my pet, idiot, and no,” Jade snorted. “More like if you upset him, he might hurt you.” She grinned, a funny little quirk of her mouth that revealed more of her flat white teeth. “You might be a huge jerk, but that doesn't mean I want him to eat you.”

Eridan swallowed nervously, casting a hasty glance at Bec and wondering if he really would eat someone he didn't like. Probably whole, he realized. Feferi giggled behind her hand and Eridan's head snapped back around, scowl returning.

“Real nice,” he muttered. “Make fun of me for not likin' your dumbass pet. I hope you both get fuckin' eaten in your sleep.”

“It's just a joke, Eridan,” Fef said, still trying to suppress her giggles. Jade nodded helplessly, not even bothering to try and hide her peals of laughter. Eridan huffed crossly and slumped further in his seat. Just then the door to the pilot's cabin swung open and Grandpa Harley walked out, tall and vigorous despite being old for a human. He wore a strange leather hat with ear-flaps, from under which his white hair protruded at odd angles. He absently patted Bec with one hand and the dog licked his palm enthusiastically as the man smiled at the three teenagers.

“We should be landing soon,” he told them. “Thought I'd let the copilot take over for a bit, come back here to see how you're all getting on!”

“Fuckin' fantastic,” Eridan muttered. Somehow despite nearly two years of experience he was not expecting the large, firm hand that suddenly ruffled his scalp. Eridan glubbed and tried desperately to rearrange his hair as Grandpa Harley chortled and Fef and Jade giggled at his predicament.

“Laugh it up,” he sneered. Grandpa Harley's hand fell again, this time on his shoulder, and he looked up to find a gentle human gaze studying him. He suddenly felt unaccountably small and awkward.

“Don't worry lad, it won't be so bad,” Harley said, smiling broadly. Before Eridan could tell him that yes, it would be, the old man had turned to face Fef. “And how are you holding up, my dear?”

Fef returned her human lusus' smile. “Alright, I think,” she told him. “A little anxious. I keep thinking how important it is that we make a good impression at this event.”

The human leaned over to plant a small kiss on Fef's forehead. “Be yourself, my dear, and they will love you just as much as I do.”

“Just as much?” Jade echoed, eyes twinkling. Her guardian returned the mischievous gaze.

“Perhaps not quite, but then I do find you quite spiffing!” he agreed. He took a step back again, his hand to Eridan's great relief leaving the boy's shoulder as he did so. Harley looked at the three of them and gave a single satisfied nod.

“I am so proud of all of you,” he told them and damn it, just hearing that made Eridan's vascular valves swell a little. That was why he hated talking to the Harley man so much; he somehow knew just how to get to Eridan, trick him into letting his guard down. It was infuriating. He wanted to say something equally disarming in response but Harley was already gone, vanishing back into the cockpit to take control of the plane for their descent and landing.

Before long the intercom crackled with an order to fasten their seat-belts and they obediently did so. Jade took a hold of Bec's neon green collar while Eridan stared out of the window, watching as they descended through the cloud layers before breaking out into the clear sky over the city of Los Angeles. He could see the lights of the city glittering beneath them already, warding off the encroaching night that was painting the eastern sky a navy velvet.

Once they could see it, the ground approached rapidly. The distant lights soon became so close that Eridan wondered how they would ever reach the airport before crashing into a building or the road. His fingers tightened on the armrests as cars that had looked like toys from a distance became close to full size, and then they passed nerve-shreddingly close to a metal link fence before the first solid bump of contact with the runway shook the plane. They glided forwards and there was another bump, two, three, before they were down and it was simply a matter of decelerating to a full stop. Eridan's fingers unclenched and he glared at Jade, who was smirking at his discomfort.

As soon as the plane was still he had undone his seat-belt and was heading for the door, the girls and Bec close behind him. Harley emerged a few seconds later, presumably leaving any other business of landing to his copilot, and with his customary cheerful smile he opened the door, which folded downwards into a small set of steps. Eridan pushed forward before anyone else could take the lead, walking boldly down the steps and letting his cape swish a little as he jumped the foot or so to the ground. Behind him, Harley just bowed a little and ushered the girls through first; Eridan would have been impressed by the respect he was showing for Fef if he hadn't known it was just an affectation, a silly show of human affection rather than a proper gesture of subservience.

On the ground, a man in a smart blue uniform was waiting. As Harley descended from the plane, the uniformed man stuck out a hand and in return the older man shook it firmly.

“Mr Harley, if I could just see your passports?” the man asked apologetically. Eridan glowered at him. As if the fucking Heiress needed some dumb piece of human paper to be recognizable!

“No, of course,” Harley said. He reached into a pocket and pulled out four passports, along with a small brown envelope. “And the documentation for Becquerel, of course.”

The uniformed man looked at the demon dog with a nervousness that Eridan would have sympathized with if the man weren't wasting their time on stupid formalities. A sharp elbow from Jade kept him quiet as the human examined their passports and Bec's papers, taking several interminable minutes to do what Eridan fucking well knew was a thirty-second job. He ground his teeth in irritation until the man passed the bundle back to Harley and stepped aside, pointing towards the low building of the private airstrip.

“If you just step through there, sir, madam, you should find your car waiting outside on the street.” His eyes flicked from Harley to Fef as he spoke, and Eridan felt himself calm a little, although he still fumed that he apparently didn't warrant addressing. Then again neither did Jade; he glanced across at her, but the human girl seemed preoccupied with staring at the high-rise buildings in the distance. Eridan sighed.

“Come on,” he said, grabbing her hand and tugging it as he followed Fef and Harley towards the building. This at least they had discussed. Whenever they were making a public appearance, Fef was always at the front, smiling and waving for the cameras that were forever watching. Harley was beside her and Eridan behind, ready to protect her at a moment's notice, and Jade stayed with Bec behind her guardian. One happy mixed-species family, picture-perfect for the media and still ready for trouble. Eridan had to admit he couldn't fault the planning, and not just because he had been involved in it. Harley really did have an almost aristocratic knack for this sort of thing, even considering his land-dwelling human limitations.

“Everyone ready?” the old human asked as he paused before the door to the building. A ragged chorus of affirmatives met his question, and with his broadest smile lighting his face he pushed open the portal to chaos.

Fef stepped through first, not losing an ounce of poise or grace to the bright flashes of light or the clamoring voices. Harley was right behind her blocking Eridan's view for a moment before they were all in the room properly and he could see the massed forces of the press before them. It was insanity; a feeding frenzy with microphones and recording devices and questions, so many questions and all of them shouted with ferocious urgency.

“Ms Peixes! Is there any truth to the rumor that you are dating a human?”

“Mr Harley! Do you feel safe, having two trolls live with you and your granddaughter?”

“How do you respond to the Ringmaster's latest killings?”

“What are your hopes for the outcome of the Alternian Integration Fund Ball?”

“Can you tell us how you feel...”

“What do you think...”

“Give us your answer...”

Eridan ignored them, focusing on looking as safe and friendly as he possibly could while up to his neck in fucking scavenger hordes baying for his flesh. Uniformed policemen stood on either side of their short route, keeping the press of people back and letting them move freely onward. Fef smiled for the cameras, waved and giggled and glubbed a little, her lips pouring promises of later interviews and revelations, Harley interweaving a counterpoint of apology- so sorry, just arrived, jet-lag don't you know, yes Alternians do get that- and they slowly made their way through the small foyer to the double glass doors that showed their car waiting just ahead, the driver standing beside it. Eridan heaved a sigh of relief as they stepped back out into the warm night air, glad at the slight slackening of pressure even as the shouts and chants of the protesters across the street became audible. The police held them back, but it was still unnerving to see so much anger and hate directed their way. Not that he didn't understand where they were coming from- hell, if he thought they had the numbers, he would have been the first one to advocate culling all the humans and taking their planet outright. But Fef would never stand for it, even if the humans on this planet didn't outnumber trolls something like twenty-eight thousand to one, and whatever certain pissblood pilots might think he wasn't a complete glubbing idiot. Eridan still kept his eyes on the horde as they moved forward, wary in their presence.

It was just then, as they were mere feet from the car, that a flaming bottle flew through the air and shattered the windscreen. In seconds the seats caught light, bright flames roaring to life as Harley grabbed Fef and hauled her several steps backwards. A shout went up from the heart of the protest across of the street and was answered by a roar of voices.

“Keep America Pure!”

For a single instant the crowd were paralyzed, and then panic struck. Dark-clad figures wielding baseball bats and more flaming bottles appeared, attacking the car and the airport building. Half of the press tried to record what was happening; the other half began to stampede with the demonstrators, pushing and shoving at each other as they tried to flee and fighting against the police who struggled to keep order and reach the armed instigators. In the middle of the chaos Eridan took up a defensive posture and wished desperately that he had his rifle. Jade's back bumped lightly into his and in the angry tensing of her muscles he could feel her making the same hopeless wish. Harley, on the other hand, did not waste time on such regrets. In one swift motion he swept Fef into his arms and started to push his way through the panicking crowd, carrying the Heiress away from the masked purists who were pointing towards them and trying to break through the aimless mob they themselves had incited.

Jade and Bec moved together on Harley's heels, the huge dog helping push people back and clear a path. Eridan, about to help, paused at the sight of the shell-shocked driver staring at the burnt-out car.

“Oh, for fuck's sake,” he snapped. “Come on, before you get fuckin' culled!” He grabbed the man by the wrist and forcefully dragged him away from the scene, using the other arm to carelessly shove people aside as he chased Harley out of the panic and down the street.

“They're chasing us!” Jade yelled, and when Eridan glanced back over his shoulder he saw that she was right. His eyes narrowed. Rifle or no rifle, these human fucks were going to regret going after a highblooded troll and his companions. He dropped the chauffeur's wrist and turned to face the oncoming foes.

Tyres screeched on the road and the oncoming thugs paused; Eridan turned to see a large, old-fashioned black car customized with bright green highlights pull up beside them. The rear door was flung open and a woman's voice shouted, “Get in!”

Harley didn't pause but stepped straight through the door with Fef still cradled in his arms, and as fast as lightning Eridan and Jade followed, jumping head first into the car and landing face-first on the green-carpeted interior. There was a moment of confusion as Bec landed on top of both of them and by the time that was sorted out the car was already speeding away, their mysterious rescuer closing the door on the retreating stares of the purist thugs.

Eridan examined her as he dragged himself up into one of the black leather seats. The first thing that struck him about her was that she was one of the darkest humans he had ever seen, her skin only a few shades lighter than the short flames of ink-black hair that rose proudly from her scalp and curled artfully around her sleek, feline face. The second thing he noticed was power; everything about her screamed of it, from the way she leaned back confidently in her seat to the casual way she lifted her slim cigarette holder to her mouth with two long, black-gloved fingers. He could feel his jaw dropping as he looked at her, vibrant and intoxicating, a thousand times more deadly and dangerous and beautiful than any human or troll he had ever seen before. He found himself wondering if this was the human equivalent of what the Condesce herself looked like.

For the second time that night, Jade's elbow interrupted his thoughts. He started then scowled across the car at the human girl, who glared daggers right back at him.

“Pay attention,” she hissed, and Eridan realized that Harley was talking to their savior. Deciding that revenge on Jade could come later, he sunk back in his seat and tried to pick up the thread of their conversation.

“... jolly grateful for your intervention,” Harley was saying. “I don't know how you happened upon us at such a fortuitous moment, but I would like to inquire as to your identity if I may.”

“But of course,” the woman said calmly, and her voice was as as smooth and rich as a chocolate liqueur. She held out a single elegant hand and shook Harley's firm meat-paw with effortless grace. “My name is Bianca Quattrocchi. And as for how I happened to be in the area...” She reached into the dark green velvet of her coat and fished a neat black wallet from an inside pocket, flipping the top open and holding it out for examination.

Eridan leaned forward with the others, curious as to what she had to show, and was surprised to see a photograph of a familiar face. The girl in the picture looked different than when last he had seen her, back on Alternia; older mostly, although the eyepatch was a surprise and he thought he saw the gleam of metal peeking out of one black velvet sleeve. The coat wasn't quite the twin of the human woman's- it was longer, the collar different, the bottom more flared, with ornate royal blue piping that lined the edges and picked out a symbol on the girl's shoulder. The rest of the outfit was darker than he recalled, closer to a human sense of aesthetics and fashion, but it was still undoubtedly based on her old FLARPing getup and her wild hair and sly grin were just the same as they had always been. Eridan felt a pleasant shiver go through him at the memories. He and that girl had really hated each other once, a proper fucking black rivalry.

“My daughter,” Ms Quattrocchi said, the faintest hint of pleasure tingeing her voice. “Adopted, of course, but I am still keenly interested in her prospects.” Her eyes slid to Fef and her lips curled upwards in a smile. “I thought it best to come and see for myself the young woman in whose hands her future rests.”

“She's very pretty,” Fef said politely. Eridan nodded mute agreement, his mouth dry. He couldn't believe she was here, on Earth. Although now he thought about it, some of the things he'd caught wind of on the ship could have been her doing. He probably should have figured it out long ago.

“She is,” the woman agreed with a chuckle, closing the wallet and returning it to her pocket. “She is also impatient, cruel and greedy.” She looked back over at Fef. “I am hoping to teach her to be demanding, ruthless, and ambitious instead. A strong woman should have those qualities, don't you think?”

Fef smiled back at Ms Quattrocchi, as calm as if they were chatting over a civilized tea instead of speeding away from the scene of a firebomb attack. “I would say that compassion is just as important, for any leader.”

The human woman seemed to be looking for something in Fef's face, and perhaps even found it, because after a moment she sat back with a satisfied smile. “You should cling to that conviction, child, and to these protectors of yours. A loyal bodyguard at your side is worth an army at your back.”

Fef nodded slowly, and Eridan was aware of some strange communication passing between the two, a message that he couldn't seem to read that caused them both to simultaneously relax and start studying the other with great care. The car settled into a disquieting silence that fortunately lasted only a few minutes before Ms Quattrocchi looked out of the black tinted window and smiled.

“Ah, I believe we have arrived,” she declared, and sure enough the car was pulling up to a set of gates which letters cast in the metal proclaimed to be the entrance to “The Veil”. Her driver, a burly human with a scar across his face and a deep scowl, leaned out of the window to press the intercom on the gate-post; after a short exchange that could not be heard from the back, the gates swung open and the car continued on up the curve of the driveway to the front door of a large house, shaded by palm trees and bright shrubs. As the car came to a stop, Ms Quattrocchi leaned over to open the door for them once again.

“It was a pleasure to meet you all,” she said, her smile small but her eyes warm. “I only hope that next time we meet, the circumstances will be better.”

“Indeed, madam,” Harley said, stepping out of the car and taking her hand. Leaning down, he planted a single whiskery kiss on her glove. “And the pleasure has been all mine. I thank you again for your timely rescue.”

The front door of the mansion opened to reveal a human girl with short blonde hair. Jade waved enthusiastically to her, holding Bec back by the collar as Fef then Eridan exited the car.

“Until next time, then,” Ms Quattrocchi said, and Eridan's last sight of her was a gleaming smile as she pulled the car door closed. They watched as the vehicle turned and drove away from the house, dark colors fading rapidly into the balmy heat of the California night.

“Interesting,” said the girl who waited in the doorway. They turned to look at her.

“What's interesting?” Jade asked her friend. The girl nodded towards the departing car.

“Do you know who that was?”

Eridan joined the other new arrivals as they looked at each other in confusion. “She said her name was Bianca Quattrocchi,” Harley ventured. “She seemed a charming woman, if a little... stern.”

“I believe that is her real name,” the girl at the door agreed with a nod. “But in this city she is better known by a different title.” She stepped back into the warm glow of the house. “Unless I am very much mistaken, that woman was the second in command of the most powerful crime syndicate in the city.”

“She was a gangster?!” Fef squeaked, and Eridan felt his vascular valves fluttering rapidly. It made sense, oh cod so much sense- that was the power he had felt on her, and no wonder she had adopted _her_ as a daughter...

“Oh, certainly,” the girl in the door agreed. “Now please, do come inside. I really am extremely curious to know how you managed to arrive here in the car and the company of the Snowman.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So that's two more chapters for this week! Now with some actual plot involved!
> 
> Thanks to people for reading and leaving kudos and stuff. It's great to know I have readers. :)


	7. ==> Be The Curious Amateur Psychologist

### CHAPTER SIX ==> Be The Curious Amateur Psychologist

Rose Lalonde had long since reached the conclusion that her mother's adoption of not one but three Alternian refugees was both the pinnacle of her passive-aggressive affections and the root of their ultimate undoing. The former she had deduced from the endless gushing at the time, the promises that Rose would have _“a new brother and sisters, isn't that jush... just the best thing,”_ and the exhausting rounds of decoration and redecoration in the rooms that had previously served as unassailable shrines to her absent biological brothers. No doubt the entire enterprise had come about solely as an attempt to impress Rose with her Mom's magnanimous nature and charitable spirit, and of course Rose had been forced to greet the interlopers in a similar spirit of joyous inclusion despite her resentment at their invasion of her home.

After several months, Rose's observations had forced her to surmise that perhaps her mother had missed Dave and Dirk more than she had previously suspected. Certainly the affections she lavished on her new children, however insincere they may have been initially, could not be described as anything less than doting. She had even cut back on her drinking, a change that had invalidated years of notes and scribbled attempts at analysis and left Rose scrambling to keep up with this new-found sincerity- the most infuriating weapon her mother had devised to date. Even more surprisingly, it was not only Mom who had warmed to the newcomers. Despite her initial misgivings Rose had found herself inexplicably drawn to her Alternian housemates and in particular Kanaya Maryam.

Intelligent, beautiful, fearsome, composed; so unlike the alien monsters the media portrayed her kind as and yet so strangely inhuman at the same time. Rose had always had difficulty making friends, finding little common ground with the childish antics of her supposed peers, and of the real people she met she had been closest to her private tutors- strictly professional relationships of academic respect. Solace and social connection had been found on the internet, but much as she loved her brother Dave and their friends Jade and John their interactions had lacked something intangible. With Kanaya, she found that missing element, and regardless of its initial intent she could not regret her mother's actions in bringing the Alternians into their home.

There had been other benefits to the change, too. It was not in her mother's nature to settle for less than the best, which in this case had meant adopting one of the undisputed leaders of the Alternians and the pilot of their ship. As the other leader had been adopted by Jade's Grandpa, the arrangement had soon begun to afford opportunities for Rose and her internet friend to meet in real life. Their first real-world encounter had been strange, disconcerting, an emotional reaction that Rose attributed to nervousness over how she presented herself to Jade and whether Jade would be anything like her online persona. She should not have worried on that score- Jade's first reaction had been to hug her, as cheerful and vibrant in her speech as she had ever been in her cheerful green text.

She looked forward to their meetings now, all of them traveling from their usual homes to gather in Los Angeles, although she did her best not to show her enthusiasm too markedly. It was pleasant to see Jade and watch her move as she spoke, always in motion except for when she curled up to sleep- often on the sofa or the rug, never for less than a full eight hours and usually for longer. Feferi, though not as sharp and engaging as Kanaya, was an enthusiastic and pleasant conversationalist, and Mr. Harley himself was always sure to ask after her health in a show of genuine caring that was quite heart-warmingly quaint. And as for Eridan- well, Rose could tolerate the arguments and the sulking and the quite frankly incessant flirting given the side effects of his presence. Sollux might emerge from his room for Feferi, but Rose had been watching them interact for a year and a half and it was Eridan who made him emerge from his shell. Sometimes the change would last for weeks after they had returned to New York state, but sometimes it was only a few hours after the others had gone before Sollux vanished into himself, becoming little more than a ghost that haunted the mansion once again.

Rose had seen enough of his changing moods to know that he needed more help than she could give him, but Sollux did not want help. So for the moment she did the only thing she could do: put her curiosity and her questions on hold while she went to find her adopted brother and tell him that their friends had arrived.

He was not in his room when she looked, the computer screens black and sleeping and the bed untouched. That left only one place he would be. Rose walked softly down the corridor and pushed open the door at the end, trying to not to startle him as she stepped into Aradia's room.

Even after all this time it was disconcerting to hear the soft pulse of the machinery, to see the tubes and wires that kept the delicate girl alive. Sollux was sitting on a chair by her side, her pale gray hand wrapped in his own as he whispered to her in Alternian. He looked up as Rose entered, the dim light reflecting off his red and blue glasses. The way it flashed reminded Rose of the first time she had seen his eyes, solid with impossible dichromatic light, a sign both of his mutation and his incredible psychic power.

She smiled, ignoring his angry glare as the reflex it was. “The others are waiting downstairs,” she told him calmly. After a moment his face softened and glanced back down at Aradia.

“Jutht... give me a minute,” he said. Rose nodded, but didn't move from by the door. He lost track of time sometimes and she wanted to be ready to remind him to move if needs be. She studied him critically as he whispered his goodbyes to Aradia: he was still too thin and too pale, his posture was atrocious, and she had to remind herself that the yellowish tinge to his skin was his blood and not an unhealthy pallor.

Kanaya had told her that on the ship, he hadn't had much time to visit Aradia. The vessel was designed to be flown by a psionic, but they had commandeered it before the full flight rig was installed and their jury-rigged solution had lacked the usual physical and mental support apparatus. Every second that Sollux spent sleeping or eating or visiting friends was a second they lost faster than light capability- which over the distances they were talking about may as well have meant not moving at all. For a sweep and a half- three years- he had pushed himself to push the ship, filling his head with star charts and relative velocities and temporal distortion mechanics while he burned up enough energy to take those years off his own lifespan ten times over. Even when he had found the time to stop being the pilot- when a mechanical fault interfered with the engines, or when they had stopped to harvest asteroids for resources- he hadn't been allowed to leave the small fortress of protection Feferi and Kanaya had built around him. Sollux _was_ the ship, and to permit any risk of him coming to harm had been utterly unacceptable.

Rose had wondered what it must have been like to live like that, your entire existence subsumed by a duty that only you could perform, and concluded that in many ways it was erroneous to call it living at all. Small wonder that he seemed so withdrawn, so incapable of engaging with the world around him, so enraged when his fellow Alternians respectfully referred to him as “the Helmsman”. Kanaya had also told her that Sollux had only agreed to fly the ship in the first place for Aradia's sake, to take her to a place where her persistent coma would not lead to an inevitable culling, a place where she might even have a chance to recover- but Rose had not needed to be told that. It was clear in the look on Sollux's face every time she found him in this room. It wasn't healthy for him, she knew that, but still she couldn't bring herself to try and tear him from Aradia after everything he had sacrificed for the sleeping girl's sake.

“There'th a new treatment,” Sollux said, and it took Rose a moment to realize that he was talking to her.

“There is?” she replied, doing her best to sound hopeful. Given her long practice it came out fairly convincingly, but as her mother had said two years ago, someone who had been in a coma for as long as Aradia had was unlikely to ever wake up.

Sollux nodded and Rose knew that he remembered the same gentle advice. “Your mother'th running a thtudy,” he said absently, rubbing a thumb across the back of Aradia's hand. “Thome human long-term coma patientth with head injurieth. She sayth if the rethultth are a thuctheth then Aradia can be in the thecond round of trialth.”

Rose nodded. “She is always saying we need to expand on the applications of medicine to Alternian physiology.”

“The'th right.” Sollux leaned over and placed a gentle kiss on Aradia's forehead before getting to his feet. “Tho, FF's downthtairth?”

“And Eridan,” Rose said, smiling. Sollux scowled, eyes crackling a little behind his glasses.

“ _Fuck_ ED,” he said with more passion than Rose had heard from him in weeks. “I am not even dithcuthing the wayth in which that nookthtain ith not worth my time.”

“Of course,” Rose calmly corrected. “I apologize, of course.” She held the door open with an exaggerated motion. “After you.”

Sollux turned his glare on her as he stomped out. “Don't think I don't know what you're doing,” he snapped. “And you can thtop it.”

“Whatever do you mean?” Rose was all innocence as she followed him down the corridor, but Sollux was having none of it.

“It'th bad enough having KN meddling in my buthineth all the time without you trying to fixth up my caliginouth quadrant, ethpecially with that thtupid fishfathed athhole!”

“I don't know what you mean,” Rose lied blithely. She was of course fully versed in the vagaries of the Alternian romantic quadrants, thanks to the discovery some time ago that Kanaya was almost as interested in writing as she was. Of course their interests were not completely parallel, but it was far easier to submit her wizardly prose for scrutiny when she received several chapters of amateur rainbow drinker fiction in exchange. Kanaya's interest in the Alternian vampire equivalent had been particularly enthusiastic of late; with a disturbing intensity that Rose had long since accepted as normal, she had been drawing inspiration from the Ringmaster killings, and the sheer quantity of blackrom in Kanaya's latest submission would have been sufficient to educate even the irrepressibly oblivious John Egbert in matters of the Alternian blood-pusher. Not that Rose would ever betray her friend's confidence by carelessly distributing her work in such a fashion.

“Sollux!”

Rose's thoughts were interrupted by the delighted cry as Feferi caught sight of the scrawny psychic. The seadweller princess leapt up from the sofa and charged up the stairs to grab him in a tight embrace. After a moment Sollux gingerly returned the hug, letting his head sink forwards onto Feferi's shoulder. For all her borrowed expertise, Rose still wasn't certain if their obvious red feelings were headed for matespritship or moirallegiance. She wasn't really sure it mattered either. Certainly they would not welcome her interference in the matter, and if they wanted her involvement they would say something directly. On the other hand, perhaps Jade could learn something more from Feferi on the subject; Rose stored the idea for future consideration and returned her attention to the conversation at hand.

“Oh, that's just fuckin' great,” Eridan was complaining to her. “Why couldn't you a just left him hidin' upstairs?”

“Shut it, you,” Jade said absently, punching Eridan in the arm. He yelped at her back as the human girl ran forwards, Feferi backing off just in time for Sollux to receive a second hug that was more energetic but less emotionally charged than the first. Bec followed his mistress and looked at the yellow-blooded boy expectantly, tail wagging.

“Theriouthly, BC, where did you get the idea I even liked you?” the boy grumbled, before reluctantly scratching the big dog's head. “Hi, JD.”

“Hi, Sollux!” Jade chirped, beaming. From behind Rose at the top of the stairs the sound of a solitary clap echoed around the hall. She turned to see her mother slowly descending to join them.

“I see our gezz... guests have arrived,” she said, smiling at them all in turn. “Rose, dear, you were just about to call me, right?”

Rose returned her smile in dazzling fashion. “But of course, mother. I was just fetching Sollux before I tried to disturb you; I know how important your work is.” Just because it was no longer so vicious and pointed, it didn't mean they couldn't still spar. In truth Rose didn't know how she would cope if her mother ever stopped offering her the challenge.

“Doctor Lalonde,” Mr Harley called, and she walked up to him with a hand extended daintily which of course he kissed like a gentleman. The two of them danced around each other so well that it was almost tiresome. Rose took the opportunity to come downstairs and take a seat in the reception room. The others did likewise, a small scuffle ensuing as Sollux sat next to Feferi and Eridan tried to squeeze himself in on the other side of a two person seat. In the end he was forced to retreat to between Rose and Kanaya, while Jade sat on the rug in front of the fire and leaned against Bec.

Mom watched the entire seat-shifting waltz with an amusement so palatable Rose suspected she would have liked to record it for later replay. When everyone was settled she swirled her drink and asked casually, “So was that the Snowman's car I saw leaving the driveway?”

For a moment nobody answered, and then four people began trying to explain at once. It took a few minutes to calm them down and reintroduce some semblance of order, but eventually in bits and pieces and with many, many interruptions the full story emerged. Rose listened with a concerned frown etching itself deeper and deeper into her face, barely aware of the same expression marring her mother's features. When the account finally finished, with Feferi's breathless description of being dropped off at the house, she got up and walked straight for the phone on the side table.

“What are you doing?” Jade asked.

“Calling the police station,” Rose said, fingers already dialing the number.

“If you don't mun... mind, dear, I think it might be better if I hang... handled that,” her mother said, plucking the receiver from her hands as the phone began to ring. “If you could get everyone sattled- settled, sorry- they must be tired after their ordeal... yes, Captain? This is Doctor Lalonde at Derse Mansion. Yes, Captain Grazer, _that_ Doctor Lalonde...”

Inwardly seething, Rose turned back to their guests. “I'm afraid your bags have yet to arrive,” she apologized brightly. “But your rooms have been made up ready for you, and we have plenty of pajamas and other night-things.”

As they began to troop upstairs, Mr Harley caught her casting a resentful glance back at her mother who was laying heavily into the poor police captain, and laid a kindly hand on her arm. “You realize that all other things being equal, a respected Doctor is going to get a far better response than her teenage daughter?”

Rose nodded, still frowning. “She did not say that.”

“Perhaps she didn't think she had to,” he suggested. She looked up at him and even though he plainly didn't understand in the least, she felt a little of the ugly anger drain away.

“Perhaps,” she agreed falsely, curtailing further discussion by turning to follow the others upstairs.

The house was large, had been purchased for that very reason, but there were still not enough rooms for everybody to have one to themselves. Now that the other half of their party was here, Rose would be sharing with Jade while Kanaya and Feferi slept in the adjoining room. Early experiments had placed Sollux and Eridan together, but after some loud and violent blow-ups Sollux now had his own room next to Aradia's and Eridan was exiled to the camp-bed in the living room. That in turn had shunted Mr Harley to the master bedroom while Rose's mother allegedly slept in a sleeping bag on the couch. Allegedly, because nobody had ever seen her actually do it, even Eridan who was meant to be in the same room. Popular opinion had it that if she was sleeping at all, she was doing so on a cot in the basement lab, but this was impossible to prove as only Sollux was capable of cracking the electronic lock on the door and he refused outright to do it.

The existence of the lab itself was an absolute necessity. In their main home in New York state the extensive cellars had been refurbished as a mere eccentricity years before, but since adopting Kanaya the alteration had become standard in all of the houses they owned. Rose's mother had insisted as a matter of the utmost importance that all of these labs be underground, heavily fortified and sealed with the finest security that she and Sollux could modify from top-end purchases. Kanaya had backed her up whenever anyone argued. For moving between houses they had a cradle of sorts that generally traveled with Aradia in a modified, bulletproof van, and whenever they arrived at a new destination the first thing they did was check on their two precious passengers. Like Aradia, the Matriorb had never yet been harmed by such a journey.

According to Kanaya, when they found the right place- somewhere cavernous, she said, dark and warm and connected to a spacious network of caves- the Matriorb would hatch into a Mother Grub. Kanaya's lusus had apparently been such a creature, and before she left Alternia she had learned how to care for the future hatchling and raise it to healthy maturity. In less than four years the Mother Grub would be ready to fulfill its vital role in the Alternian reproductive cycle, accepting pails of genetic material and from the resulting incestuous slurry producing the eggs that would become the next generation of Alternians.

For the past two years, when not working directly on Alternian medicine, Rose's mother had spent most of her time in the lab with Kanaya trying to solve the logistical nightmares this procreative necessity had spawned. Mr Harley had already offered his help in seeking the perfect location for the future brooding caverns, but even his resources had no answer to the question of how the genetic material would be transported to the Mother Grub or who would raise the resulting wigglers to adulthood. Rose had watched her mother and Kanaya struggle over samples of vital compounds that had been easily available on Alternia, sending them to labs to construct chemical formulae and testing the results on careful cell samples taken from the surface of the Mother Grub only to go back to the drawing board when some slight mismatch indicated disaster. She had watched them try to map the biological process by which the eggs were made, attempting in vain to calculate if the number of offspring was tied to the number of genetic contributions or the size of the Mother Grub or one of a thousand other variables and then turn those numbers into a sustainable population estimate. She had watched as they tried desperately to find data, produce information, supply answers to Feferi and Mr Harley- who as far as Rose knew spent their every waking moment trying to persuade selfish and ignorant but nonetheless powerful people that they really did want the Alternians to thrive on Earth.

To Rose, watching them work was reminiscent of some of the terrible action films that John had insisted she watch. Not in quality or even in dramatic tension, but in the sense that they were a small band of disparate heroes, a tight-knit unit of comrades standing against impossible odds to save something truly important. The best she could do was stand with them and hope that her contribution meant something, that their efforts would result in the same victory that John's movie heroes invariably enjoyed. Her latest attempts at assistance- calling the offices and secretaries of various senators and actors and well-to-do business partners to seek political and fiscal backing- had somehow resulted in the upcoming gala ball. The publicity had been positive, but Rose worried as always that things would go awry. She was a part of this group, one of them, and she knew how badly they needed this fund-raiser to work if the Alternians were to survive on Earth at all.

The sound of laughter from the room opposite drew Rose out of her concerns, reminding her that no matter how serious things became her friends were here now, safe and well. She hurried to put on her nightgown and in short order they were all ready for bed. By some miracle hot cocoa was waiting for them in the kitchen and Rose gladly took a mug, sitting down to watch as the others were drawn in by the warm milky smell. No matter how many times she saw it Rose was still fascinated by how much her Alternian friends loved chocolate, and she couldn't quite suppress a giggle when Kanaya of all people snarled to warn Sollux away from her mug. Sollux ignored her in favor of filling his own mug with an oversized handful of marshmallows, which he then practically inhaled before excusing himself upstairs. In all likelihood he would remain awake all night surfing the internet, but at least he had made an appearance. Rose just hoped he would be rested enough to be alert for the fund-raiser the following night.

When Mom appeared to tell them that the police were sending someone over, the unanimous agreement was that jet-lag would have to wait a little longer. A few expeditions upstairs furnished the living room with enough comforters and blankets to keep everyone cozy and after some digging a copy of the first Harry Potter film- sent by Dave as some sort of of bemusing ironic birthday present- was unearthed. Everyone squabbled over seats and just as they got settled the doorbell rang, Mom answering the door to find their beleaguered chauffeur on the front doorstep. He was brought inside and pacified with strong Irish coffee, agreeing to wait with them for the police to arrive as they rearranged themselves once again into some semblance of comfort.

Several minutes into the film Eridan declared it to be unwatchable musclebeast shit full of crap that wasn't even real and stormed off to have a hissy fit elsewhere. Rose, curled up against Kanaya on the sofa with her feet on Bec's warm side, didn't think anything of it until a little later when the unpleasant pressure of her bladder forced her to move. The nearest available bathroom was the one adjoining her bedroom, so she quietly padded upstairs away from the warm glow of the living room. After relieving herself, she was exiting onto the landing when she heard a loud thump from down the corridor, in the direction of Sollux's room. Concerned she paused; when no reaction was forthcoming from downstairs, she set out to investigate, worried that her friend could have had an accident. As she drew closer she noticed that his door was open, and her heart skipped a beat because that was not right. Sollux always kept his door closed. There was an odd shuffling noise coming from inside and... muttering?

Then she got close enough to see into the room, lit by the twin glows of the computer monitors and the bright little desk-lamp, and her face flushed so hard that she was in danger of spontaneous combustion from the heat of her skin. Sollux was lying on the floor, Eridan kneeling over him and holding him down. Yellow-tinted fists clenched in the seadweller's shoulders tight enough to draw blood as the finned boy nipped, growling, at his partner's neck. The faint murmurs resolved into a string of whispered obscenities, and Rose backed carefully away to the stairs before either of them realized she had witnessed their caliginous makeout session.

It seemed Sollux really hadn't needed her butting into his quadrants. How long had the two of them been together? They had certainly done an outstanding job of hiding it, leaving the others separately so as not to arouse suspicion- and now she thought about it, there had been plenty of times over the last couple of years where they could have found similar opportunities. Rose wondered if perhaps she should inform Mr Harley or her mother, to make sure there was a responsible adult keeping an eye on things. Then she realized that the proverbial horse had long since had the opportunity to bolt and there was very little point in closing the stable door at this juncture. Since they clearly valued their privacy, she was willing to oblige and remain silent on the matter, and any further fallout that ensued was entirely their own problem.

She wondered if Feferi knew, and then thought that she probably did. Sollux was dancing around a red quadrant with her, and although Eridan was not he would clearly have liked to be. Actually, that was probably one of the key sources of rivalry between them: Sollux garnering so much of Feferi's affection and Eridan so much of her time, while both of them wanted more than they had.

Rose shook her head as she joined the others in the living room in time to see Harry and his friends running from giant spiders in the Forbidden Forest. Alternian romance was considerably more complicated than her wizardly courtships, but from what she understood the competition and violence of kismessitude was a good and healthy thing for them in a way that it would not be for a human relationship. She resolved to keep a closer eye on her friends in future nonetheless.

Harry and his friends had just escaped from their ordeal when the doorbell rang. Rose watched as her mother got up to answer it, and found the remote to pause the film when she returned with two men in tow. One wore jeans and a leather jacket, a mop of brown hair framing his wide-mouthed face; the other was stockier and wore a suit, his heavy black eyebrows stern in a kindly sort of way on a face that was angular and craggy. The men both produced LAPD badges and showed them to the room.

“I am Detective Francisco, and this is my partner Detective Sikes,” the second man said.

Feferi snickered and Detective Sikes groaned. “Yeah, I know, my name is the Alternian word for excrement and cranium. I've had it explained, thanks. Now which one of you ladies is Feferi Peixes?”

Feferi raised her hand, still grinning, and the man sighed. “Figures.”

“I assume you are here about the attack earlier,” Mr Harley interrupted. Detective Francisco nodded.

“Yes, that is why we came- but if you don't mind, while we're here we would also like to gather some information for another case of ours.”

“And what case might that be?” Mom purred, sliding past the two men. Rose nearly face-palmed with embarrassment, but the detectives remained unfazed by her blatant flirtation.

“Well, ma'am...”

“ _Doctor_.”

“... sorry, Doctor,” Detective Francisco corrected, “we wanted to ask Miss Peixes and any other Alternians in the house some questions pertaining to the Ringmaster.”

Rose glanced over at Kanaya and Feferi, and were surprised to see that they had frozen stiff in place. It was certainly not characteristic of either of them, and guiltily she found herself curious to see what it was that could spook them both so utterly. Whatever else it was, Rose knew it was bound to be interesting to learn more.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Celyn does dumb things! Like deciding to change update schedules for no reason!
> 
> So yeah, I have now decided that instead of updating two chapters once a week, I will update one chapter twice a week, mostly because I don't wanna wait a week to update. That is the sum total of all the logic behind this decision, which maaay have been spurred by having a few days off that led to a fit of feeling like it's the weekend again already.
> 
> But anyhow. Here is a chapter. There will be another one this weekend. Hooray!


	8. ==> Be The Scheming Spider Bitch

### CHAPTER SEVEN ==> Be The Scheming Spider Bitch

Vriska Serket loved being exactly where she shouldn't be.

Not that she shouldn't be in the van, not really. Sure, if you wanted to get all boring and technical Crowbar had told her she couldn't come along, and before that Snowman had threatened to lock her in her room and throw away the key if she ever stowed away on any Felt jobs again, but they didn't really mean it and even if they did they would forgive her. After all, if she had never done things she wasn't supposed to do then she would never even have met Snowman, and then there was no way the woman could have adopted her!

And Snowman was, in Vriska's opinion, the best human mother any troll could wish for. The very best. What other mother had a gang of flunkies? Or a small fleet of bulletproof vehicles in the garage? Or a mansion with three secret exits- four if you counted climbing down the drainpipe outside her window to the kitchen roof and jumping a four foot gap onto the hedge, which Vriska did because she had discovered it and nobody else had yet. Vriska got the best chefs, the best tailors and the best tutors to cater to her because Snowman was the best and she wanted the same from her daughter.

Not that Vriska hadn't always known she was destined for greatness. Long ago on Alternia she had found the journal of her ancestor, Marquise Spinneret Mindfang, and discovered that the former bearer of her symbol had been a feared Gamblignant, the leader of a deadly pirate fleet. Inspired by the history she had become a dedicated FLARPer, excelling against all others in the deadly roleplaying games until she had amassed a vast fortune to invest in the weapons trade, a thriving rivalry with the descendant of her ancestor's kismesis, and a steady supply of weaklings and losers to keep her immense arachnid lusus fed and contented. If things had just stayed on track then she would probably have been running half the planet by now, but instead bad luck had struck in the form of a meddlesome meddler named Terezi Pyrope.

They had been friends in those days, an unstoppable FLARPing duo; the Marquise and the mighty Redglare, Scourge Sisters extraordinaire! But then Terezi had started to get upset about her feeding so many people to her lusus, insisting that they should only be hunting the wicked and the guilty- never mind that Vriska herself could get eaten if she didn't keep her lusus fed, but did Miss Smarty-Pants ever consider that? No she did not! Instead she nagged and she bothered and she pestered until Vriska was completely fed up with her. And then there had been that one little incident with Tavros, which was his own fault for being so completely useless and a coward and always trying to run away all the time. It was absolutely his fault that she had lost her temper, and he was so weak-willed that it was too easy to just make him do what she wanted. It wasn't even as if he'd died from the fall, but the way Terezi had been carrying on you wouldn't have though so. Then the puny idiot's bitch friend Aradia had used her own psychic powers to haunt Vriska in revenge.

Vriska was willing to concede that mind-controlling the lowblood's matesprit and using his telekinetic powers to collapse her hive and leave her in a coma had probably been excessive, but the haunting had kind of put her out of sorts. How was she supposed to know that Terezi was going to flip her shit over a pair of lowbloods, one of whom she didn't even know? She hadn't believed it when her fellow Scourge Sister had contacted her on Trollian and started fishing for an apology, and when she demanded to know what her partner was up to she had stared unbelieving at the reply on the screen.

GC: 1 W4S PROB4BLY JUST GO1NG TO K1LL YOU

There had been only one sensible response to the threat: mockery. There was no way she was serious.

AG: Hahahahahahahaha!  
AG: You mean from your tree? With all your AMAAAAAAAAZING POWERS?  
AG: Tell me, what sort of powers do tree girls have? Swinging from vines and stuff?

Seriously, who even lived in a tree? It was a dumb place for a hive.

GC: MY TR33 DO3SN'T H4V3 V1N3S >:[  
GC: SOM3TIM3S 1 L3T OTH3R P3OPL3 SW1NG FROM ROP3S THOUGH >:]  
GC: Y34H 4NYW4Y YOULL B3 D34D 1N 4 COUPL3 M1NUT3S

Wait, shit. That actually sounded serious. The thought had crossed her mind then- but no. No way. Not even Terezi could arrange Vriska's death from so far away, not so soon, not without powers, and she had called her on it.

AG: Yeah right!!!!!!!!  
AG: Complete and total muscle8east shit!

She had almost heard Terezi's psychotic grin in the reply. The confidence of it.

GC: 1F YOU DONT B3L13V3 M3  
GC: WHY DONT YOU CONSULT WITH YOUR USU4L SOURC3S  
GC: TH3Y S33M TO H4V3 4LL TH3 4NSW3RS

Vriska had been sure it was some sort of trick. Certain of it. Could Terezi have got to her informants and corrupted them somehow? Fed them false information? But how could she? Even Vriska herself wasn't completely sure who all of them were, the names gathered from her adventures and dug up from the internet and paid to provide her with quality intelligence from the piles of ill-gotten riches stored in the base of her hive.

AG: I don't need to do that to know you're 8luffing.

There was no way Terezi could be telling the truth. Right?

GC: Y34H  
GC: BUT  
GC: YOU KNOW YOUR3 GONN4 4NYW4Y  
GC: S33 Y4 >:]

Shit. She was right. Vriska had to know what she was up to, and even false information was better than nothing. If any of the informants turned out to be lying she could always track them down and torture them to death later, but right now she had to know. The tab for the online drop-box had been saved on her computer forever and she had clicked on it without even a second thought. There had just been enough time to read the words “1 TOLD YOU SO” flash across the screen before her monitor had exploded.

When she had come round minutes later, her eightfold vision dark, the stump of her arm throbbing as it leaked cerulean blood onto the floor, the only thought in her mind had been: make her pay. Terezi was too strong-willed to manipulate directly, but that didn't make her invulnerable. Tavros was as easy to control as ever, and his powers let Vriska contact Terezi's dumb unhatched dragon lusus and through that, her charge. One sleepwalking mishap later Vriska got back in touch to generously offer a truce. It took a while and her typing was terrible, but Terezi had agreed. Vriska still wondered sometimes how long it had taken the other girl to get someone to read the message to her.

At any rate, despite getting her neighbor to make her a decent prosthetic, the incident had pretty much put paid to her meteoric success. She kept FLARPing because her lusus had to eat, but without her old ally it just wasn't the same. It didn't matter, though: she had known for certain that something else would come along, and it did. She had kept bothering Tavros after the incident- it didn't matter what anyone else thought about it, she knew she was only trying to help him out, make him less of a weakling- and a couple of seasons in she had noticed that he seemed to be holding something back.

Anything that Tavros wanted to hide from her had to be worth knowing, and it was hardly difficult to get information out of him when she wanted it. The direct approach had always been the best start with him, and she had applied it expertly.

AG: Taaaaaaaavros!  
AG: Are you hiding things from me?

His response had been predictably transparent.

AT: i'M NOT, HIDING ANYTHING,  
AT: wHY WOULD YOU, UH, THINK THAT?

All she had needed to do was get him flustered enough to admit to something, anything, get the thin edge of the wedge ready and squared.

AG: I can tell because I know you Tavros.  
AG: I know you are a liar. A big fat LYING LIAR.  
AG: But you are going to tell me what you know.

It was laughable how he floundered about. He was a flounderer, that's what he was.

AT: uM, ACTUALLY, I REALLY CAN'T, i'M NOT MEANT TO TELL YOU ANYTHING,

She had latched onto the crack she had made in his flimsy armor, and she had widened it. It had been adorable to watch him flail and wriggle on her hook.

AG: So there IS a secret!!!!!!!!

Of course he attempted to deny it. It was sort of cute, in a totally pathetic way.

AT: nO, UH, I DIDN'T MEAN THAT,

She had kept pushing, of course. It wouldn't do to give him time to recover- or run.

AG: Hah, I am onto you. But it's okay.  
AG: You can tell me. I am only trying to help you.  
AG: I promise!!!!!!!!

Then, surprisingly, Tavros had shown a hint of bravery.

AT: tHAT, IS A LITTLE HARD TO BELIEVE,  
AT: sINCE YOU, UM, CRIPPLED ME?

Huh! How dare he challenge her? She was interrogating him for his own good!

AG: Oh, you're not stiiiiiiiill going on about that?

She had tapped her fingers impatiently on her desk until Tavros' inevitable apology had appeared on-screen.

AT: sORRY,

Ugh, it was infuriating, how useless and weak and stupid he was. Vriska had fought back the frustration, though, because she needed him to talk to her, not clam up with fear.

AG: It's okay. I will forgive you........  
AG: ........ if you tell me the secret!!!!!!!!

Come on, come on. Whatever this big mystery was, she had to know. It was her right to be told.

AT: uM,  
AT: i REALLY, REALLY DON'T THINK i'M SUPPOSED TO TELL YOU,

She had known right then that she had him caught. He was going to spill everything; he just needed a little reassurance.

AG: So it'll be just between us. You and me.  
AG: I promise I won't tell anyone.  
AG: I'll even help you keep it quiet and not spill the beans to every two-bit loser that leans on you.  
AG: Pleeeeeeeease?

The reply had appeared slowly. Hesitantly. She hadn't doubted for an instant what it would say.

AT: ... oK,

He had told her everything and it had been even better than she had dared to hope for. This plot to steal a ship was it, what she had been waiting for, the next big thing, her ticket to greatness! That was the day her luck had changed for the better, and after that it had all gone her way. Sure, shortly after their conversation Tavros had told Terezi, who had started to get on Vriska's case again. Like she even cared what some dumb backstabbing blind girl had to say. She had other sources, all the sources, and from them she had learned where to go and when and what to wait for. When the message had come she had left with the bag she had been packing and repacking every day for nearly an entire season, going impatiently through the motions as she waited for the ship to be ready for her. Everything else in her hive she had left without a backwards glance.

Perhaps her lusus would eat Vriska's former neighbors, or perhaps those same neighbors would kill the creature first. Either way, she wasn't Vriska's problem any more. She had known it was her purpose in life to travel on the ship, of course, but she hadn't expected the dizzying sense of relief as Alternia fell away beneath her, the lightness as she stepped off the battered shuttle into a cavernous docking bay. She had looked around at the thousands and thousands of other children and adolescents pouring aboard, and she had known that this was her chance to make a mark.

Marquise Mindfang would have been proud of her descendant. From the moment the ship left Alternian orbit Vriska had been working, putting her irons in the fire, greeting strangers and testing her powers and gradually working out which of the people around her were strong and which were weak, which ones would follow her without question and which ones would challenge her authority. It only took her a few short hours to make a couple of friends- or stooges, or lieutenants, whatever, it made no difference when they started haunting the corridor outside the first mess hall they found. They had grabbed the rations off anyone in the line who didn't have the guts to fight back and recruited half the ones who did, vanishing like smoke to another area of the ship as soon as anyone tougher took an interest. Hit and run, rinse and repeat, and before long they did whatever they felt like, kicking smaller and weaker trolls out of the recuperacoon bays and taking anything they happened to leave behind as some of them slept and others kept watch for danger. As they slowly metamorphosed from scavengers to hunters, taking from stronger and stronger opponents, Vriska had named her gang the Gamblignants after the pirates of yore.

After a while things had started to settle down, different power groups appearing across the sections of the ship. Vriska had been smart enough to realize before some of her fellow bandit chieftains what that would mean, and by the time the gang leaders started hunting raider bands she had a few more irons on the go. Pacts with powerful groups, promises not to touch them but to bring her loot back to their area to spend, knowing which zones would protect them if they behaved- it was easy to make safe havens for her people, give them options to retreat to. She had laughed her ass off when she found Terezi's little zone, so disciplined and respectful and safe. She gave her people strict orders never to break the law that her rival enforced and mocked her by using her zone as a safe haven, trapping Terezi in her own insistence on fairness and justice. It served the bitch right to fume after what she had done and Vriska loved every minute of it, taking solace in her constant victories the few times Terezi managed to undo her plans and schemes. The damage was never too great; the Gamblignants could always find new lawless places to raid, gangless zones and no-man's-lands where everyone was wary and nobody was ever safe. Those were the good days, when they had been rich in rations and sopor and as many ridiculous trinkets as they cared to carry. But as time went on, the sopor grew more and more scarce. Even for the Gamblignants there were days where they had to sleep in piles instead of recuperacoons, and they all wondered what would happen when the last of the sopor ran out.

What happened was the Night of Blood, and the greatest raid they would ever make. Oh, they had gone crazy- of course they had, everyone had gone crazy- but unlike the woolbeast trolls in the zones they had not fallen on each other. No, Vriska's Gamblignants were sleeker than that, hungrier, and when they went hunting they hunted together. They had run howling through the carnage where there had once been safety and they took what they wanted, when they wanted, because the world was insane and they had gone mad with it. Before it. Because of it. The ship was theirs and they belonged to it, and whatever it offered them they gladly took.

Then they had been fucking gassed, and when Vriska woke up surrounded by her sleeping comrades things had changed. There were no more safe havens, no more pirate zones and rich lawless areas ripe for the plucking. Everyone was hiding, either alone or behind walls that they built together, and nobody had any trust left for strangers. The wide halls that they had once proudly owned filled with the hastily swelled ranks of the ship's crew, who descended in swarms on anyone foolhardy enough to start trouble. Exiled to the service corridors and catwalks the Gamblignants had limped along nonetheless, living on pathetic scraps and the occasional desperate raid, losing people to desertion as much as to battle until there were only a handful of them left.

After the ship crashed Vriska had lost track of her few remaining followers in the chaos, and she hadn't bothered to try finding them again. She had known for a while that it was time to move on, and as she stood on the firm ground of an alien world and watched the unfamiliar stars twinkle brightly overhead she had known that this was it. This was the place where she would finally seize her great destiny.

Quarantine had been stupid, and the humans even stupider. Terezi had managed to track her down and spout some musclebeast shit about being her auspistice to try and keep them together, but the first night they were out of Quarantine Vriska had just got up and left the house they had been placed in. She hadn't even had to use her powers; there had been nothing keeping her in. Nothing to make her stay and put up with Terezi meddling and Tavros being a complete wiggler, nothing to force her to sit around and wait for some human chump to come and choose her like a lusus choosing a grub. If her life on board the ship had proven anything to Vriska, it was that other people had only ever held her back, and she was done waiting for the world to recognize her greatness.

As she had suspected, it was easy to get whatever she wanted on the Earth planet. Her powers worked fine across species and although they had more resistance than lowbloods she could still manage slight suggestions or knock humans out easily enough. The few who were strong-willed enough to shake her control or remember her presence rarely did more than run away or call legal enforcers- and the few times Vriska was actually cornered by the police, their minds proved to be as malleable as anyone else's.

The most difficult thing had been finding a place to stay. At first she just broke into a new house each night and forced the inhabitants to stay asleep until she left in the morning, but as she accumulated more and more stuff that quickly stopped being practical. Before long she had broken into an empty house in a bad neighborhood and started to use her powers to turn away anyone who might be a bother. Once or twice an interloper managed to push through her mind control and get inside, but they never lived long enough to regret it. Vriska dumped the bodies by the gang marks on the street and let someone else take the blame. It was almost like being back on Alternia, minus the hungry lusus demanding to be fed a regular diet of troll flesh, but Vriska was bored. She had everything she needed and there was nothing interesting to do on this planet.

To try and alleviate the tedium Vriska had started making her own adventures, stealing more and more things that happened to catch her eye, using her powers to walk unmolested into the homes of the rich and famous and take whatever she felt like. She started a new treasure pile, full of diamond jewelery and little gold statuettes and marble sculptures. Her walls were adorned with the pilfered possessions of Hollywood society. It still wasn't enough. She started to take more risks; challenging herself not to be seen at all, not to use her powers, not to leave signs of her presence. It was still too easy, knowing that she could never be caught, because Vriska was untouchable and her own invulnerability was killing her. Addiction is a powerful thing, and under its heady spell she had started trying to steal from the mansions in broad daylight, creeping past the owners without powers to get the sense of the old adventuring thrill until one day, in a mansion where the carpets were green and the furniture was black leather, a heavy hand had landed on her shoulder.

She could have escaped, but she was so desperate for something exciting to happen that she had pretended to be caught. Vriska had let the thin man with the heavy underbite drag her upstairs to an office that gleamed with polished ebony hues. There, behind a great black wooden desk and a heavy open ledger, there had sat a dark-skinned human woman in a green velvet coat and a wide-brimmed black hat.

“And who have you found here, Trace?” she had asked, tapping ash from the end of a cigarette into a perfect marble ashtray. Vriska had stared because everything about her was so flawlessly, perfectly composed. The man had mumbled and fussed and explained that he had found Vriska trespassing downstairs, and did the boss want that he should break her in half or were they calling the police today?

The woman had got up and walked to the other side of the desk, leaning forwards to look Vriska square in her one good eye. “Neither, I think,” she had said with a smile. “Do you know who I am, little girl?”

“I dunno. Some stupid human?” Vriska had shrugged. The woman had slapped her face then, calmly, like it was simply the done response. With the other hand she had reached into Vriska's pocket and pulled out the glittering emerald necklace the girl had lifted from one of the upstairs bedrooms. It dangled accusingly in the human's hand, reflecting the light and scattering it across the room.

“I am Snowman,” she had said, her voice running cold. “And as far as you are concerned I own the crime in this city.” Her eyes narrowed. “How dare you steal from me?”

Vriska gaped. Forget the soft alien skin and the flat teeth, the hornless head, the clothes from another world and a different time. If she closed her eyes, she could easily have imagined herself to be face to face with Mindfang. With that thought came a strange resolve, and meeting the deep brown glare with her own gray adolescent eyes Vriska reached out to touch the mind of the man called Trace and pushed.

Snowman's eyes flickered to watch as her henchman collapsed in a deep sleep, but otherwise she showed no outward signs of having noticed. Vriska grinned at her, showing every single one of her extremely sharp fangs to the woman.

“I am Vriska Serket, descendant of Marquise Spinneret Mindfang, and I stole your stupid necklace because I was bored and I can take whatever I like, _bitch_.”

Slowly, so slowly that at first Vriska had thought she was imagining it, Snowman's lips had curved into a smile. The woman had stood and walked back to the other side of her desk, dropping the necklace into a drawer and locking it with a tiny silver key. Only then had she looked back at Vriska, still standing by the form of the unconscious Trace.

“Then we shall have to think of other ways to keep you occupied, shall we not?” she had said.

Vriska hadn't understood at first, and even when Snowman made the offer to adopt her plain and forthright it had seemed incomprehensible. She had accepted nonetheless, seeing the potential of the arrangement and wondering idly if perhaps this was why she had been drawn to the ship, to this world, to this particular mansion. That night she had slept under silk sheets and the watching eye of a very confused Trace and his brother Fin, while Snowman sat in her office and made phone calls. By the time she awoke the following afternoon, there was a new set of clothes in her size waiting for her, understated but expensive.

“I'll not have my daughter dressing like a vagrant,” Snowman had said.

There had been questions next: where she had been living, what her powers were, what skills she had without them. Snowman asked first and later, when the child services people came, she had been told what lies to say. After they had gone Vriska had seen Fin and some other men moving crates into the basement. She had investigated later, to find her own collection of prizes, all neatly boxed up and moved to her new home.

“As if I'd let them find any evidence to use against you,” Snowman had said.

Tutors had followed, and more new clothes based on Vriska's scribbled designs. She had fought back against the need to work to someone else's schedule, and more than a few people had been found sleeping face down when they should have been watching Vriska. After several weeks of this, Snowman had sat her down and explained that however unpleasant it seemed at first, it was impossible to get anywhere without discipline.

“If you want to learn from me, you must do things my way,” Snowman had said.

Vriska did want to learn from her, very much so. She was everything Vriska wanted to be on this world, so the girl had done as Snowman asked- to a point, at least. She had come to understand that a mother was in some ways like a lusus who cared for you and in some ways like an ancestor who gave you something to live up to, and she thought that Snowman might be disappointed if she simply conceded every battle without challenge. Nonetheless, though she would hardly admit it, Vriska hardly bothered keeping any irons in the fire at all these days. Having all of the plans and weaving tangled webs was what Snowman did and she was the best, the very best of all. Sneaking out to join the boys when they did jobs was one of the few things Vriska still schemed about, partly to keep herself sharp by trying to stay ahead of her mother but mostly because jobs were fun. And besides, her mother's flunkies were pretty dumb. If she didn't go along to keep an eye on them the Felt could get in all sorts of trouble!

Reasoning that they were far enough from the mansion that it was too late to turn the van around and take her back, Vriska knelt up in her seat, poked her head through the small window into the driver's cab, and asked,”So where are we goiiiiiiiing?”

Crowbar jerked in the driver's seat and nearly sent the van crashing head-first into a lamp-post, instead swerving dangerously across the road and provoking some angry honking from fellow road users. Cursing a blue streak he managed to clumsily park with a wheel on the kerb while Quarters in the passenger seat grabbed Vriska by the collar and held her awkwardly in place.

“What the _fuck_ are you doing here, kid?” Quarters growled. Vriska smirked at him.

“Better take your hands of me,” she purred. “Or I will make you pay.” She locked eyes with him and grinned. “You know I can do it.”

“Let her go, Quarters,” Crowbar ordered, and with a hiss the flunky obeyed. Vriska continued to lean through the window as the mobster lieutenant studied her, a furrow of thought creasing his brow.

“Shit, we've gotta get you home,” he muttered.

Vriska snorted. “Puh-lease. You take me back now and you'll have to explain to Snowman why you cut the job short.” She lifted one hand and thoughtfully examined her blue-painted claws, the nail varnish an affectation that she had appropriated from her guardian and adapted to her own needs. “Sure, she might be mad with me, but if she learns you let her precious daughter stow away with you _again_ you're dead meat.”

“You fucking brat...” Quarters began, shifting forward in his seat. Crowbar's hand shot out like lightning to hold him back, almost as fast as Vriska's eyes had locked with her new target. Almost. She held back the psychic blow she had readied at the last instant in favor of blowing Quarters a kiss and giggling.

“If you hurt her the boss will have our heads,” Crowbar said, casting a nervous look at Vriska. He looked between her and the road a few times, then slammed his hand onto the horn with a loud curse. As his broad shoulders slumped, Vriska reached out and patted him gently on the back, ignoring the ferocious glare Quarters turned in her direction.

“Soooooooo, what's the plan?” she asked. Crowbar sighed and shook his head.

“Wake the other idiots up while I get us to the drop point,” he muttered. “I ain't explainin' this any more than I gotta.”

It took several minutes to bring the rest of the gang round, and several more to straighten out that nobody was telling Snowman that Vriska had got them again- nobody, no way, no how. Crowbar took them to the third storey of a parking garage that was full of cars and empty of people. There they all huddled uncomfortably close in the back of the overly small van, shuffling their feet to avoid the map that their leader laid out on the floor. Vriska ignored the chaos around her as people jockeyed for places and leaned in close over Doze's legs to get a closer look, recognizing the streets of Los Angeles before she was shoved aside by a thin-limbed bundle of energy.

“What's that? What is it?” Itchy asked, stabbing a freakishly pale finger at one of the red dots scattered across the map. Vriska simultaneously tried to lean away from him and push him back- nobody was quite sure what unfathomable cocktail of drugs Itchy was on, but they tended to make him hyperactive, irrational, and excessively stinky. Unfortunately he was just stable and useful enough to be worth keeping. Vriska still didn't want to touch him, ever.

Crowbar solved the issue by reaching over and grabbing Itchy, bodily lifting him over the map and pinning him one-handed to the wall of the van. “Everyone sit the fuck down and listen!” he yelled. The Felt scuffled for another moment or two before finding equilibrium, Eggs and Biscuits catching on slightly after everyone else and earning themselves a glare from Crowbar. The front-line leader of the Felt tapped at the map with his signature weapon.

“Right,” he said, looking around at his crew. “You all remember a couple o' months ago, gettin' in a major showdown with the Midnight Crew?” A chorus of sheepish nods and a few thoughtfully fingered healing scars provided assent and Crowbar grinned wolfishly. “Well, while we was all gettin' our asses kicked by those fuckwads, Clover here was gettin' close enough to put a bug on their wheels.”

There was a small chorus of cheers and back-clapping which served to almost flatten the tiny mobster. Crowbar waited the jubilation to die down before continuing.

“This here is a map of all the places we been trackin' them to. Tonight we're gonna be figurin' out which ones are their hideouts and scopin' the lay o' the land.” He looked around the room. “Boss has a plan to turn some o' these places over to the cops, cripple Spades' operation before we move in fer the kill, but it ain't gonna work if they see it comin' so we gotta be _smart_.” He pointed to the two hulking forms who were by necessity wedged out of the way at the back of the van. “Cans, you and Matchsticks are on distraction duty. Take Eggs and Biscuits and hit the Crew here.” His finger stabbed down at the largest of the red splotches. “Their van was there most time, so if they ain't there now they'll come runnin' fast. Quarters, I want you with 'em to call and let the rest of us know they're busy.”

The crew members nodded understanding, which was probably a lie in the case of Eggs and Biscuits. Vriska listened intently as Crowbar ignored the idiots and moved on to the next phase of the explanation.

“Now the rest of us, we gots ta check out these other dots. Most of 'em are clustered up, so it oughta work if we head out in pairs. Trace and Fin, you're up here. Itchy, Doze, you get Chinatown- and Doze?”

The heavyset man looked up at Crowbar with lidded eyes. “Yeah?”

“If you get pinched or captured I will end you myself, you stupid fuck.”

Itchy giggled as Crowbar turned to the remainder of the Felt. “Clover, Sawbuck, you're a team in this district here; it's nasty ground so watch your backs. Die, you're with me and Vriska's coming with us so try not to be a creepy fucker any more than you gotta be.”

The thin, dreadlocked man blinked slowly but did not argue. Vriska nearly bounced with excitement and resolved that her team was going to be the best one. Of course they were all working towards the same goal, but that didn't mean someone couldn't do better, and that someone would naturally be her. They were going to find the most and best hideouts of anyone!

Assignments given, Crowbar reached into his pocket and pulled out several key fobs, tossing them to the different teams. The van key he put carefully in Quarter's hand while the rest of the crew piled out and went looking for their wheels. One by one the pairs sped away in innocuous, anonymous vehicles, until Vriska was left standing between Crowbar and Die watching as the distraction team took off in the van.

“This way,” the big man said, striding towards a battered-looking saloon car that sat near the down ramp. Vriska strolled after him and after a moment so did Die, eyes staring vacantly into space as usual. He looked sopor-fried, or whatever it was humans used in place of sopor, but Vriska knew better than to believe it. Die himself didn't talk much but according to Clover, who was pretty chatty most of the time, that bug-eyed stare was the expression that meant he was either working out how to kill someone painfully or thinking about getting laid. Vriska had decided that she didn't really care so long as he kept his stupid red-blooded brown-skinned human hands to himself while she was around, and so far he had behaved admirably in that respect.

The three of them piled into the car, Vriska's attempt to clamber into the passenger seat thwarted when Crowbar physically grabbed her arm and almost threw her into the back.

“Hey! I got there first!” she protested. Crowbar remained unperturbed.

“When you're old enough to come on jobs all legit and with your Momma's blessin', princess, then you can ride up front. Until then, Die is my goddamn wingman and you are stayin' in the back where I fuckin' know you're safe.”

She could have gotten her way if she had really wanted to, but she was already starting to get a warning ache between her horns from putting the rest of the Felt to sleep earlier. Her powers were the coolest, but there was no reason to push herself, even if it did mean sitting in the stupid back seat like a wiggler. Vriska went quietly and sulked as they drove out of the garage and onto the city streets.

The city was bright with neon and street lights, the artificial glow making the surrounding shadows seem even darker. Their journey quickly took a turn into a bad neighborhood, not entirely unlike the one Vriska had lived in before meeting Snowman. She forgot to be sullen as she peered appraisingly out of the windows, noting the people both troll and human who eyed the car as it passed them by. They passed buildings that were little more than square enclosures for people, crumbling with neglect and colorful with graffiti. Vriska sneered at the uninspired architecture, far below the standards of the Felt mansion. No wonder the Midnight Crew were such a bunch of losers, if they couldn't even find themselves a better place to live than this. Snowman always cautioned against underestimating them, intimating that their leader, Spades Slick, had deliberately sought out the craziest and deadliest motherfuckers the city had to offer in the hope that they could keep up with him. Vriska knew that in a straight fight, the Crew would usually beat the Felt. But as far as actual plans went, they were utterly incompetent, and it seemed that their ineptitude extended to living arrangements too.

The car pulled up at the first address on the list and the occupants were greeted by a boarded-up shop front. The street was practically deserted, and Vriska thought that Crowbar was going to make use of his namesake, but instead he beckoned to his cohorts to follow him as he strolled around into the alley at the side of the building and dragged the fire escape down to street level.

“Stay close,” he whispered and Vriska did so, her eyes fixed on Crowbar's square back as she felt Die hovering a few feet behind her. They climbed the rusting metal stairs to the second floor, to discover a broken window facing the alley. Crowbar grinned and carefully shoved his arm through the hole, the window swinging open in seconds at his touch to allow them entry. Inside, the building was dark and covered with scraps of paper. Vriska could see in the dark better than either of the two men, and she snickered as the pair started to bump into the hard edges of abandoned furniture, Die hissing in pain and Crowbar swearing as quietly as he could manage.

“Something funny, kid?” Crowbar snarled. Vriska just grinned widely in response and the heavyset man glowered. “Quit fuckin' about,” he snapped at Die, denied satisfaction from his preferred victim. The other man gave him a startled look and Crowbar tripped over an abandoned desk drawer. Vriska couldn't suppress a small giggle at his red-raced attempts to stay quiet.

“Alright, that is IT,” Crowbar hissed. “We are splittin' the fuck up. Anyone sees anythin', don't touch it none, come get me. Don't holler.”

As if Vriska would do something so stupid. Contemptuously she strode out past the two men to go and search the ground floor, determined that she would find something amazing before either of them did. Assuming, of course, that there was something to find- after ten minutes of exhaustive examination, the closed-off shop front had provided nothing more useful or interesting than a few old receipts and a leftover bottle of Faygo that had rolled under the counter. Vriska eyed it with animosity. Stupid boring shop. How was she supposed to beat the other teams to finding the best hideouts with this kind of luck?

“Okay, that's it,” Crowbar said, coming down into the shop with Die in tow. “We're movin' on.”

“But we haven't found anything!” Vriska said, slamming a palm down on the counter in frustration. Die reached over to give her a little pat on the shoulder and she bared her teeth at him, causing him to snatch it right back again.

“Nothin' to find, princess,” Crowbar told her, shooting a warning look at his wingman. “Either they got done usin' this place, or they ain't moved in yet, or they ain't plannin' to do nothin' with it and were just stoppin' nearby to visit a hooker or somethin'.” When his hand fell between her shoulder blades, Vriska didn't chase him off. “We'll find somethin' tonight,” he promised her. Vriska huffed and leaned into the hug- then froze.

“Wait,” she whispered, then heedless of the humans' confusion she darted forward to look at the irregularity that had caught her eye. A slight bump in the thin rug that covered the floor behind the counter, which she hadn't seen before because it was out in the open and not hidden under the counter or anywhere else she had been meticulously searching.

She pulled back the beige mat and was rewarded with a trapdoor, slim handle almost but not quite flush with the floor, and Crowbar didn't even have time to try and stop her from tugging it open to reveal a ladder descending into pitch darkness, entirely heedless of the possibility of booby traps.

“Do either of you have a flashlight?” she asked the men, not holding out much hope, but to her surprise Die reached into his jacket and held out a slim pencil light. Crowbar stared at him.

“Why the fuck were we stumblin' around in the dark for if you had that, idiot?”

Die shrugged and Vriska ignored them, gripping the lit flashlight in her teeth as she climbed down the ladder and trying not to think about where it might have previously been. The thin beam illuminated a low-ceilinged but otherwise sizable cellar, furnished with a couple of red couches that looked to have been salvaged from a tip and a table that was scored with deep knife marks. Three doors led off the room; Vriska examined the first one as Crowbar descended and discovered a broom closet. Crowbar followed her lead as she opened the second door onto a room containing little more than a cot and a closet. Crowbar pulled the closet doors open and whistled; Vriska looked and her eyes grew wide at the small armory of guns and knives stashed there. They spent a few minutes snapping pictures on a digital camera that Crowbar produced from his coat before trying the third door. It led to a room furnished with nothing but a heavy metal ring in the wall and a pail in the corner, which made Vriska flush a brilliant shade of blue. Crowbar slammed the door shut fast and snarled at Die, who was doing the bug-eyed look again.

Vriska ignored both of them and turned her attention to the main room, rooting through the piles of paper on the desk as carefully as possible. They were a mix of complete dross and potentially valuable- Droog's laundry list was probably not worth anything, and neither was the scrawled game of Hangman, but there were several sheets of what looked like a heist plan and the heavy black book was some kind of ledger. Then just as Crowbar got done berating his subordinate, Vriska hit paydirt.

She had a fraction of a second before the two men noticed her staring at the discovery, and then they were right beside her with their jaws dropping as they realized what she had found. It was familiar in a way; a map of the city not unlike Crowbar's own, with small marks at various locations that Vriska knew without even checking would correspond to some of the red marks on their map. Unlike the map of possible Midnight Crew Hideouts however, this guide had a key.

Vriska stared as Crowbar pulled out the camera and started to take snaps. She read the jagged, uneven scrawl that she recognized as Spades Slick's handwriting informing her which locations were out of use, not safe, fully prepared, armed to the teeth and defended or utterly unprotected. The first location they had tried, and they had fully completed the mission: now that was luck! And talent, of course. Vriska preened as she slid the map back where she had found it, following the two men back up the ladder and out through the second storey fire escape. Crowbar was on his phone to the rest of the boys, telling them to get their asses back to the drop point right the fuck now because their team had just succeeded beyond their wildest dreams. Vriska knew that Snowman would be ecstatic with the news, and naturally proud of her daughter too. If Vriska hadn't come with them, they would never have spotted the trapdoor, and her mother couldn't deny the truth of that.

As she clambered into the back of the car she fingered the cell phone in her pocket. Its built-in camera wasn't as good as the one Crowbar had brought along, and she had only had a moment to take photographs, but she was pretty sure she had pulled it off. She wasn't quite certain what use having a copy of the map would be yet, but it was valuable information and would be worth something to someone. Snowman was her mother, and had been good to her, but Vriska knew that she was never going to get anywhere if she didn't start putting some irons back in the fire.

As the nondescript car sped through the streets of LA, Vriska leaned back and smiled, full to the brim with the thrill of beginning to weave a brand new web of power and reminding herself that the game had only just begun.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Today's update is a little late because I am visiting my partner's parents - and their new Lhasa Apso puppy!
> 
> For those who don't know what a Lhasa Apso is like- imagine a small mobile bathmat with an Ewok face and an inexplicable love of shoving their face into flowerpots.
> 
> SO CUTE! :)
> 
> Now I gotta go back to keeping an eye on my laptop lead...
> 
> EDIT 08/12/2012 - Adding a credit/reference in here. The trollian conversation between Vriska and Terezi in this chapter takes directly from (and is largely the same as) their canon conversation in Homestuck. I would add a link but the site is currently down. :/


	9. ==> Be The Adorable Catgirl Witness

### CHAPTER EIGHT ==> Be The Adorable Catgirl Witness

Nepeta Leijon did not as a general rule mind bloodshed. On Alternia she had stalked and killed her food alongside her feline lusus and eaten it raw, the blood of her kills making for vibrant wall paintings of various hunt stories and romantic pairings. Then again, on Alternia she had never seen walls painted bright with trollish blood, and after reaching Earth she had never expected to again.

There was a lot of shouting after Equius carried her into the house and explained the situation to their carers. Surprisingly it was gentle, caring Paige who was the most incoherently furious, yelling non-stop for five minutes at the silently bowed head of the blueblooded troll. When Warren dragged her into the corner to calm her down, Antonio had taken over, listing every single thing Nepeta's beloved moirail had done wrong over the last day and a half. His cold tone was even worse than the yelling had been, and Nepeta turned her head to burrow into her moirail's sheltering arms. With him there she felt safer but it was still too much and no matter how hard she tried she couldn't stop shaking like a tiny squeakbeast.

Equius felt the motion and cradled her a little closer. “Please...” he tried to interject, but the list of his mistakes continued unabated. Wanda stood and placed a calming hand on Antonio's shoulder.

“I think that's enough for the moment,” she said sternly, and the glowering human man fell silent as she frowned at both Equius and Nepeta in his arms. “Equius understands his mistake, and Nepeta needs our help right now.” She turned to the kitchen doorway, slightly ajar, and placed her hands on her hips. “In here, right now!” she ordered.

The door swung open and a half-dozen eavesdroppers trooped in, expressions ranging from outright defiance to squirming embarrassment as they prepared for the expected scolding. Instead, Wanda stared at them silently for a few seconds then let her face soften.

“Antonio and I are going to be taking Nepeta and Equius to the police station,” she said. “So I need you all to behave yourselves for Warren and Paige tonight.” She looked at the row of assembled faces. “Best behavior from you all.”

A chorus of confused assent followed her request, and as they left the room Nepeta caught a glance over Equius' shoulder of Warren attempting to organize the small group of spies into some sort of deputy squad. Everything was always a game for the dark-skinned human man, and Nepeta wished that he was the one coming with them instead of the more authoritative Antonio and the positively regal Wanda.

She had to let go of Equius in order to be buckled into the back seat of the house's minivan, but rather than fight against the indignity as she usually would she submitted, letting Wanda fasten her in as fast as possible before resting her head back on Equius' shoulder. Her moirail wrapped his strong arm around her again and she could feel how carefully he held her. That care usually made her feel even safer, but not tonight. Not when her mind kept replaying an old memory, one that she had done everything to try and forget.

_Kneel, motherfucker._

She shivered again and wrapped her claws in his black wifebeater, soaked through as usual with his cool damp sweat. He held her a little closer as the minivan began to move, stretching the seat-belt as he buried his face between her small conical horns into the blue fleece of her hat.

“Do you...” he began, then swallowed nervously. “Would you like me to call Doctor Lewis for you?”

Nepeta closed her eyes and seriously considered the offer. The human doctor had been so much help to them both when they first arrived, and she was sure he would be able to help again... but how would she explain what was wrong to him? She wrapped herself a little tighter around Equius' muscular torso and reminded herself that however difficult it was, she had to talk with her moirail about what was bothering her.

“No,” she told her strong palemate, rubbing her cheek against his shoulder and purring a little. “I don't need a stupid human purrson.” She looked up into his face with wide, green-flecked eyes. “Just purromise me that you'll keep me safe.”

Equius looked back at her as solemn as she had ever seen him. “I swear it,” he whispered, kissing her forehead. “So long as you will have a fool like me.”

Nepeta purred again. “You're my meowrail, silly,” she giggled. “I couldn't pawsibly find someone else I pity like you!”

Equius let out a sigh of relief. “I am glad you are safe,” he said calmly. “I was becoming quite distressed by your prolonged absence.”

She could imagine. Without her around Equius usually forgot to have any fun at all; he could be such a grumpy puss! It was a good thing he had found his Sifu to look after him, or she would have had her work cut out trying to keep him relaxed around so many humans. She smiled, already feeling better with her moirail at her side. He was like the pillar that held her up, solid and strong and dependable, and without him she would crumble and fall into pieces.

“I purromise I won't leave you alone so long again,” she told him. Equius' fingers played gently with the sleeve of her oversized army surplus shirt, leaving heavy creases in the thick fabric.

“I was hoping you would promise me something else,” he admitted after a moment. Nepeta twisted around to look up at him, ignoring the way the seat-belt slipped clean off her shoulder.

“What?” she asked, curious as she batted at the sleek black hair dangling either side of her moirail's face. He ignored her game in favor of glaring sternly from behind his square sunglasses.

“Nepeta, I do not believe it is safe for you to wander the streets alone while this madman is on the loose,” he said, and suddenly her blood-pusher was stuttering with unwanted memories again. She shoved him away sulkily and sat back up, staring pointedly at the other side of the minivan.

“Nepeta...” he began. She pouted. If he wanted to discuss this, he was going to have to do it on her terms.

“The sleek huntress hears the call of the musclebeast outside her cave,” she said. “She wonders what he could pussibly want at this hour.”

Equius sighed. “Please do not force me to engage in this foolish pursuit.”

“The huntress thinks that maybe he is just being noisy for the sake of it, since he already purromised to keep her safe and that should be the end of it!”

There was a moment of silence, then Equius hesitantly spoke. “The... the noble musclebeast asks the huntress if maybe she would consent to allow him a moment of her time?”

Nepeta glanced back around. “The kitty is curious, so she pads over to where her purroud and beautiful friend waits. She is careful not to move too fast, in case he thinks she is hunting him!” As she spoke, she turned back around in the seat and wriggled closer to Equius, who sweated nervously. “She tells him to be quick, because she doesn't want to wake her cubs.”

“I...” Equius began before correcting himself. “That is, the musclebeast tells the mighty huntress that he cannot keep her safe if she runs into the dark forest without him. He points out that even if he could keep up, he is afraid that he might not always be strong enough to protect her.” He stared fixedly at his lap. “He thinks that perhaps the huntress should consider staying closer to her cave, at least until the dangerous monster in the forest is gone, because it came too close to catching her last time.”

Nepeta put her head back on his shoulder. “The huntress agrees with the musclebeast,” she whispers. “She purromises to be more careful of the monsters.”

Street lights flashed through the windows of the minivan as Equius silently hugged her, and she knew that what he meant was I'm sorry, and I'll protect you, and I pity you so much. She snuggled back into him and thought that she was sorry too, and she was never going to let him worry so much ever again.

They pulled up in front of the police station and climbed out of the car, Nepeta walking on her own now although she still leaned against her moirail. Wanda led the way into the precinct while Antonio brought up the rear, and as they reached the front desk she paused.

“What did you say the name of the detective was?” she asked Equius.

“Sikes,” he said, flushing blue. Nepeta giggled a little at the silly name. Humans could be so funny!

“Wanda Quinn and Antonio Ramirez,” she told the desk sergeant. “We're here as the guardians of these two minors to see Detective Sikes.”

The man glanced at their small group and nodded. “Just a moment, ma'am,” he said with the politeness most people found when talking to Wanda. He got up and walked to the glass double doors at one end of the atrium, and leaned through them into the nearly empty precinct office.

“SIKES! FRANCISCO!” he yelled, and Nepeta jumped a little at the sudden noise. “YOUR WITNESS IS HERE!”

The man stepped back as two detectives as different as chalk and cheese walked out into the blue-painted hall. The suited man politely shook hands with Wanda and Antonio while his long-haired partner scrutinized the two teenage trolls.

“Nepeta Leijon and Equius Zahhak, I presume,” he drawled. Equius tilted his head in assent.

“Detective Sikes,” he observed. “I am most relieved to discover you are not an imposter.”

The human nodded. “You're pretty big. Do you work out?” he asked. His partner glanced at him sharply but said nothing.

“I... do some Tai Chi?” Equius told the men. Nepeta could smell his confusion and she giggled.

“He's pawfully strong even without purracticing!” she told the two detectives. “And it used to be that he furgot and broke things, all the time!”

“Ah, I would imagine that is one of the reasons you pity him,” the suited detective said, smiling. He glanced at Equius. “You are a lucky young man to have such a clearly devoted pale quadrant so early in life.”

Nepeta blinked in surprise. Humans usually got confused by moirallegiance, almost as much as they did by the black quadrants. “How did you know we were meowrails?” she squeaked. The suited man turned his smile on her, and it was a very nice smile indeed.

“Your partner happened to tell my partner when we called your cellphone earlier,” he said, and now Nepeta did vaguely recall something of the sort happening, although she had mostly been concentrating on hanging on to Equius at the time. “But even if he hadn't, one of my sons is Alternian, and with the amount of effort he puts into assimilating human culture I could hardly do any less in return.”

“Look, this whole tr- Alternian cultural exchange you've got going here is great and all,” the other detective interrupted, looking as though he thought it was anything but. “I'm just saying that unless you have another break in this case to pull out of your ass, we should probably think about having a word with Nepeta here. Right, kid?”

Nepeta glanced at Equius then nodded hesitantly. “Yes. I would... it would be purrefurable to get this ofur with.”

“I just want to make this clear,” Antonio broke in. “Nepeta isn't being charged with anything or interrogated here. She hasn't done anything wrong. Other than staying out all night,” he added, glaring at her for a second.

“No, of course not,” Detective Francisco said soothingly. “We are simply looking for a witness statement from her; we don't consider her to be a suspect.”

“And Nepeta?” Detective Sikes added, looking right at her. “You're not sixteen yet, right?” She nodded and he shrugged. “Then we're not allowed to question you without a guardian present to look out for you. If you or your guardian feel at any point like it's necessary then you are allowed to ask for a lawyer.”

Nepeta glanced up at her large palemate. “Can Equius stay with me too?” she asked in a small voice. The two detectives shared awkward glances.

“I'm afraid not,” Detective Francisco said eventually. “Unfortunately, police procedure was not written with Alternian quadrants in mind.” As her face fell, he moved a little closer and bent down to eye level with the short girl. “But he can wait right outside, and if at any time you want to stop and see him, I think we can manage that,” he told her.

Nepeta nodded bravely. “Okay,” she said. Equius and Wanda both took seats on the black vinyl seats in the atrium, the imposing woman nodding to Antonio to go with Nepeta, and the girl felt strangely relieved to have the sternest and least forgiving of their carers at her back. She followed the detectives through another set of double doors opposite the precinct office and down the corridor to a bright, square interview room. A lone table sat in the middle of the chamber, a chair on either side of it, and Detective Francisco vanished back into the other room to find a chair for Antonio while Detective Sikes fiddled with a small black audio recorder.

“Okay, I think I got it,” he said as his partner returned and Antonio took a seat. Detective Francisco checked the device before going to lean against the far wall. “Right. This is Detective Sikes and Francisco conducting an interview with Nepeta Leijon, Antonio Ramirez sitting in as her guardian. Say hi for the tape, Nepeta.”

“Hi,” she squeaked, the blinking light and quiet room suddenly making her unaccountably nervous.

“Okay,” Detective Sikes said, smiling at her. He had a nice smile too, although it was very different from Detective Francisco's- more cunning and less kindly. Part of Nepeta's mind started wondering what quadrant she would place them in on a shipping wall. Probably moirails, she decided, although being human they were probably in some sort of strange professional relationship that overlapped with friendship. Especially since so many humans had that funny heterosexual fetish. She had needed to do an awful lot of work on her diagrams since coming to Earth to accommodate human romantic behavior.

“Do you recognize this?” Detective Sikes said, putting a clear plastic bag on the table. Inside was a familiar object.

“That's my cellphone,” she said, confused. “I thought you knew that already?”

“We just needed you to confirm it on the tape,” Detective Francisco said, pointing to the audio recorder on the table and then a small camera discreetly hanging from the corner of the room opposite him. “Witness just identified the cellphone found at the crime scene,” he added, leaning over the recorder on the table as he spoke.

“Which brings us to the big question,” Detective Sikes said. “Nepeta, we found this cellphone lying in a pool of blood in an alleyway next to two dead bodies. It was clearly dropped after the blood was already spilled, which leads us to believe you know something about what happened. We would like you to tell us what.”

The girl pulled her legs up onto the chair with her and began to pick at the denim on her knees with her claws. “I didn't see the meowderer,” she told them. “Not his face.”

“That's okay,” Detective Francisco said. “Just tell us what you did see.”

Nepeta took a deep steadying breath, like Sifu had taught Equius and her moirail had taught her in turn. “I was furollowing a man,” she began. “I like to do that sometimes, fur fun. I know humans can get cross about it, though.” She glanced nervously at Antonio, who rubbed a hand across her back.

“Not today, chica,” he told her. The detectives nodded assent, and reassured Nepeta continued. “It's fun to purrtend I'm hunting when I explore,” she explained. “I try not to furighten anyone.”

“Do you explore often?” Detective Francisco asked. Nepeta nodded, then remembered the audio recorder.

“Yes,” she squeaked.

“And do you usually... follow someone, when you're out and about?”

“Um, most days?” Nepeta paused and stared at the ceiling a while. “I like to watch people. It's inpurresting and I learn stuff about humans all the time.” She scratched absently at one of her ears. “I'm not going to get in trouble for that, am I?”

“Not at the moment,” Detective Sikes said. “You might want to lay off a bit in future. You were telling us about the man you were following yesterday?”

Nepeta nodded. “He was homeless,” she told them. “I purrfer to follow different people all the time and I sort of liked his coat so I thought I might as well see what he did. He was furry observant though, so the... I mean, I had to be extra-special careful. The... I took care to stay high up and back in the shadows where he kitten'd see me.”

The detectives exchanged a glance. “Nepeta, if you don't mind my asking,” Detective Sikes said slowly, “is there a reason you're, ah...”

“She makes cat puns all the time,” Antonio said, breaking into the hesitant question. “It's fairly common with Alternians- unusual speech and writing quirks as a sort of compulsion or reflex.” He looked thoughtfully at Nepeta. “I'm actually rather impressed that you've resisted the urge to discuss your actions in the third person.”

She smiled proudly. “I mew humans get confursed when I rolepurrlay at them,” she said. “So I am trying pawfully hard not to because this is impurrtent.”

“Well, thank you for your consideration,” Detective Francisco said, smiling reassuringly. “But if you feel it's easier to talk about it in a different way I think we can manage.”

Nepeta nodded and felt a knot inside her come looser. “The huntress was stalking her quarry,” she told them, and she saw their eyes go a little wider but this was so much easier to describe this way. “It was getting darker and she thought that she should go home to her cubs soon, but she was a curious kitty and the man had walked so fur that she wanted to know where he would stop!”

Detective Sikes was scribbling some notes on a pad, and Nepeta leaned across the table to try and squint at them. He pulled the notebook back away from her gaze and she pouted.

“Please, go on,” Detective Francisco said. Nepeta glanced at Antonio, who nodded, and she settled back into her chair with a little little hiss for the man across the table.

“The huntress was most inpurrested when her quarry turned into an alley and stopped suddenly. She was stalking him from high above and could see from a fifur escape across the street, but there were a lot of shadows in the way.” Nepeta paused and swallowed nervously. “She could see... a shape. Someone else in the alley. Then the man she had been purrsuing fell over and she could tell he was dead.” She rubbed at her face with one gloved hand, frowning. It had been so fast; she had barely blinked and the shadowy shape had moved. In all her life she had only ever seen movement that swift once before.

_You think you're faster than me, little kitty? HOW MOTHERFUCKING CUTE!_

“How did you... I mean, how did the huntress know the man was dead from so far away?” Detective Francisco asked, snapping her back to the cool darkness of the interview room. It was too dark, too square, too plain. Too much like the ship. Nepeta shivered and without thinking told the truth.

“She had seen it befur,” she said. “And she didn't like it, but she had to be purrfectly certain, so she waited and she waited, but the shadow-man never came out of the alley so in the end she had to go down.”

Part of her could see that the three men were hanging on her every word, but the rest of her was in the past, climbing down from the fire escape and cautiously advancing in the shadows, so hopeful and so afraid of what she would or would not find. The alley loomed like a mouth, a gaping maw of darkness in her memory, and she faced it down as she had done once before.

“The clever kitty knew she had to be carefurl in case she was caught, but when she looked out furom her hiding-place the only people she saw were lying down.” She had known then, of course she had known. “She took her cellphone out, ready to call her meowrail, and purrowled furwards. First she saw the lying down men were both dead, a human and a troll, and they had both been ripped and cut apurrt, and there were pawdles everywhere.” She was crying now, green tears spilling over her cheeks, and Detective Francisco walked over to offer her a packet of tissues from his pocket. She took one and mopped uselessly at her face.

“The little kitty didn't want to purrn around,” she whispered. “She was so scared, but she had to know. She purrned to look and she saw the pawctures, all the blood and the words he pawt on the wall.” She mewled a little and tried to hide her face behind the tissue. “Are you next?” she repeated, remembering the gory, dripping message in discordant stereo images. Antonio wrapped an arm around her and it wasn't like Equius, it wasn't even close, but it was better than nothing so she let him hug her as she let out more little mewling sobs.

“Nepeta...” Detective Francisco began hesitantly, leaning forward over the desk, “I understand that you have been through something terrible, and it is clearly and understandably very distressing for you, but I have the feeling that there is something else about this that you're not telling us. You said you were ready to call your moirail, so you already suspected what you would find; why did it shock you badly enough to make you drop your phone?”

Antonio glared at the detective. “Are you joking?” he growled. “This kid has just witnessed a murder and you're accusing her of, what? Lying to the cops? Do you want me to report you for harassment?”

Nepeta looked from him to Detective Francisco, who had a nice smile and a son who was a troll and who knew what a pale quadrant was and even more importantly why. She remembered the look of terror on the dead troll's face and remembered how Equius was always, always telling her to be more responsible. She remembered how scared her moirail had looked when he found her- how scared she had felt, running around the city in a panic. She didn't want to be that scared ever again. She didn't want anyone to be that scared, and that was how she realized she had made her decision.

“I did lie,” she said, and she felt rather than saw Antonio's surprise. The detectives both focused on her again and she felt her stomach slide. “I did tell a lie. But not here. In Quarantine.”

“How is that...” Detective Sikes began. His partner cut him off with the wave of a hand.

“What lie did you tell, Nepeta?” he asked gently. She avoided his gaze, instead playing with the fabric of her sleeve, tracing the folds Equius had left earlier.

“When we were talking to Doctor Lewis about the ship,” she whispered. “It was supurrsed to be a secret. We kitten't tell him.” She bit her lip nervously. “I... I don't think I'm supurrsed to tell you. Equius might get mad.”

The detectives shared a glance. “It's okay, Nepeta,” Detective Sikes said. “He seems to care about you a whole lot. I think he'll forgive you.”

Nepeta nodded nervously. “It wasn't his fault,” she explained, wide-eyed.

“Who, Equius?” Detective Francisco asked. Nepeta shook her head.

“No, silly!” she squeaked. “He was... he was one of the only ones...” Her tears started spilling again and she mopped them stubbornly up with a sleeve. “We ran out of sopor,” she told them. They looked at each other, confused.

“I don't understand,” Detective Sikes said. “How is this tied to your weird tr- Alternian drugs? Are you saying the killer was on sopor?”

Nepeta shook her head again. “No,” she said, and took a deep breath for the next admission. “And yes. Because we all were.”

The silence in the room seemed to grow deeper, a gaping chasm hungry for the words that poured out of her to fill it. “Back on Alternia, everyone slept in sopor. It kept us from having nightmares so we'd be all calmer and furendlier. I mean, I didn't sleep in it all the time, but that was pretty furny of me! Most people used it every time they slept but on the ship we ran out and everyone started getting angrier and I was so afuraid and then everyone went mad.”

The human detectives exchanged a glance. “Mad how?” Detective Sikes asked, slowly. Nepeta chewed her lip, tasting metal as green blood began to leak from the torn skin.

“They started killing each other,” she whispered. “And Equius said he'd keep me safe, but we had this furend called Gamzee who didn't just sleep in the sopor, he used to eat it even though you're not supurrsed to.” She buried her face in her knees. “And he was really sweet and furny and always mew how to make you feel happier but when we found him there were bodies everywhere and he was writing, he was writing on the walls and he was going to cull us except Karkitty came along and made him calm down and I don't know, I don't know what happened to them but last I knew they were alive and when he was writing on the walls that's what Gamzee wrote, Are You Next.” She stopped and wriggled her head a little, burrowing deeper into herself. After a moment, Antonio's arm slipped back around her shoulders, gentler than she had ever thought the stern man could be.

“Do you need your moirail, chica?” he asked. Nepeta nodded shakily and unfolded, letting herself be led towards the door. The four of them made their way back out to the main reception where Equius leapt to his feet and pulled her into his arms as soon as they emerged, glaring fiercely at the humans.

“Hey, wasn't us,” Detective Sikes protested, raising his arms helplessly. “Blame the son of a bitch who went around killing people in front of her.”

“Matthew,” Detective Francisco said warningly, before looking over at Equius. “I think we have most of what we need; your moirail has been very helpful.”

“So can we go?” Wanda asked. The detective shook his head.

“Not quite yet. I would like Nepeta and Equius to sit down with our sketch artist as soon as possible.” He made a complicated gesture at his partner, who glared then went over to the reception desk, picked up the phone and started dialing. Equius looked at the suited detective in surprise.

“I do not understand. How is my assistance necessary?”

The detective frowned. “Because you have met our new suspect, which brings me to the other question.” He paused for a moment, seeming to consider his words. “What can you tell me about... Gamzee and Karkitty, was it?”

“Karkat,” Equius corrected as Nepeta nodded. “But why would you...” He broke off and stared down at his moirail in shock. “Nepeta, what did you tell them?”

She squeaked and clung to his arm, digging small claw-marks into the gray flesh. “Equius, I'm sorry! But the bodies, and the writing... I think it might be him, I really really do!” Her eyes brimmed with tears. “I had to tell them about the ship. Purrlease don't be mad at me!”

Equius sighed and she felt him relax a second before one strong hand came up to pet her head gingerly. “I cannot say I was ever truly comfortable with the deception,” he said. “And if you believe the Highblood is responsible, then telling the authorities was the correct action.”

“Really?” she asked, looking up at him in surprise.

“Really,” he replied firmly. There was a cough from Detective Sikes, and they looked round to see him waving the phone receiver at them.

“Sketch artist is on the way,” he said. “Should be here soon.”

“Good,” Detective Francisco replied, before turning to Nepeta, Equius and the two carers. “I'm sorry, but if you'll just wait a little longer- I'm sure we have some recycled coffee and stale doughnuts around here somewhere...”

“SIKES! FRANCISCO!”

The two detectives turned to look at the short, angry-looking man who had just stuck his head out of an office at the far end of the precinct.

“Problem, Captain?” Detective Sikes asked calmly.

“Damn right there's a problem!” the Captain yelled. “I have Doctor Lalonde on the phone, as in the woman who has half the Alternian leadership under her roof, demanding to know why the other half of that leadership got assaulted on the way in from the airport!”

The two detectives exchanged a glance. “Captain Grazer,” Detective Francisco said with impressive calmness, “we have just had a significant break in the Ringmaster case and I feel that perhaps some other officer...”

“Do you see any other detectives around here?” the Captain snapped, waving a hand at the deserted office. “And I can't just send a uniform, this is a political disaster! Your witness will still be there in the morning. Now get your asses down to Derse Mansion and smooth this over!” So saying, he vanished back into his office, the door slamming sharply behind him. The two detectives stared at it for a moment before turning apologetically back to the four onlookers.

“I am so sorry about this,” Detective Francisco began, but Wanda waved him off with her hand, silencing the protest building in Antonio's eyes with a sharp glare.

“It's quite alright, detective,” she said with a small smile. “I understand. How long before the sketch artist arrives?”

Detective Francisco glanced at his partner, who shrugged. “Forty-five minutes?” he offered.

“Well, then, I believe we can probably afford to wait without you dancing attendance on us,” the woman smiled. “And I'm sure Equius and Nepeta don't need you present to give a description.”

Detective Francisco smiled at her. “Thank you,” he said before turning to the two Alternians. “But is this okay with you?” he asked. Nepeta and Equius looked at each other in silent communion for a few seconds.

“The arrangement is... acceptable,” Equius answered slowly. “Is there any other information we can provide before you leave?”

It was the turn of the detectives to communicate silently. “Nepeta mentioned that she didn't know what happened to your friends,” Detective Sikes said after a moment. “When did you last have contact with them?”

Equius considered for a moment. “On board the ship,” he said. “Around three Earth years ago. At that point they had recently become moirails and were physically in good health; I do not know what has transpired since then.”

“Is there anything else you can tell us about them?” Detective Francisco asked. Equius shrugged.

“Many things, few of them relevant,” he said. “I knew Gamzee Makara since we were both wigglers and he was seemingly nothing more than a harmless sopor addict and circus cultist. His... uncontrolled... behavior came as a great shock. He is an indigo-blood, so particularly strong, and from what I know of his caste he has some sort of latent psychic power, but I regrettably cannot provide any more information as I do not know the details. Karkat Vantas I knew for considerably less time, but I can assure you that he is bad-tempered, constantly pollutes the air with his foul language, and the only thing of any real note about him is that he has red blood.”

Detective Francisco frowned. “Rustbloods are fairly common, aren't they?”

Nepeta shook her head, waggling a finger solemnly at the detective. “Not rustblooded; bright red, like human blood. Karkitty was a mutant.” She paused and stuck her tongue out at her moirail. “And he was only pretending to be grumpy. He was really playful, deep down.”

Equius sighed. “Nepeta, I am not having this discussion again.”

“Gamzee Makara and Karkat Vantas,” Detective Francisco said, pulling out a notebook and pen. “Indigo-blood, strong with possible psychic powers, and mutant red-blood with no known unusual abilities.”

“Still a troll,” Detective Sikes said. “So he's stronger and faster than we are, not to mention that thick gray skin or those nice sharp claws...”

“ _Matt,_ ” the other detective protested, but he jotted another note down anyway. “I suppose since we're going to see the Alternian leaders, we could ask if any of them have an idea about finding these two.”

Nepeta felt Equius shift nervously, and she wrapped her arms around his waist. “It's okay,” she whispered. “You behaved like a purrfect gentleman.”

“I am simply concerned that my careless words could cause embarrassment for our leaders...” her moirail began. She shooshed him by putting a finger firmly across his lip.

“If I did the right thing, then so did you,” she told him firmly. Silently he bent to plant a small kiss on top of her head, and she then knew for sure that she had been right to tell the police about Gamzee. As the detectives left and she curled up against Equius to wait for the sketch artist to arrive, she reasoned that when someone goes crazy and tries to kill you they can hardly expect you to look out for them any more. And if the real Gamzee did still exist- if he was still in there somewhere and hadn't just died when the purple-blooded monster inside him woke up- then he would want to be stopped from hurting all those people. Nepeta batted thoughtfully at her moirail's hair as she considered the conundrum, and wondered why she still felt so guilty for betraying her friend.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yay update! Characters have already been introduced. Here, have plot.
> 
> Note: I know jack shit about police procedure and even less about US police procedure. I can't even claim to have watched a whole bunch of cop shows, because I tend to prefer _how_ -doneits to _who_ -doneits. So basically I pulled the above out of my ass and am currently praying that I didn't fuck up big time. This maneuvre is repeated at later points in the story, naturally.
> 
> Also thank you all for reading and I hope you continue to do so. From this point on, things will be moving faster (duhn duhn duuuhn!) :)


	10. ==> Be The Kindly Seadweller Princess

### CHAPTER NINE ==> Be The Kindly Seadweller Princess

Feferi Peixes did not generally consider herself to be dishonest, but as Eridan had once bitterly pointed out, for a truthful person she spent a great deal of time deceiving others. A dismayed part of her realized as she smiled innocently at the detectives that lying was becoming far too natural a response.

“Of course, whale help however we can,” she said, letting a hint of confusion drop into her voice. “But I don't see how anemone here might know anything about the Ringmaster.”

“We don't expect that you will, precisely,” Detective Francisco said. “We were hoping to get more of a general background on some past events that could be relevant.” Feferi's vascular valve sank in her chest- it was exactly what she had been afraid of. She wondered how many of her falsehoods were coming unraveled.

“I'll go and fetch the boys,” Grandpa Harley said, starting to get up from the armchair he was settled in. Rose leapt immediately to her feet, a slight blush on her cheeks.

“No, allow me,” she insisted, darting for the stairs before the old man could object. Feferi watched her go, wondering how long she had known about Sollux and Eridan. It would be nice to have someone to talk to about it, instead of just being caught in the middle of their stupid black flirtation. She had honestly considered acting as auspistice for them but Sollux was just too pitiable for her to go through with it. And not just pitiable- if he hadn't needed a moirail so badly... but he already had a matesprit, and she knew better than to try and compete with Aradia. Sollux hadn't crossed light-years of space for Feferi's sake.

After half a minute or so Rose reappeared, two slightly flustered troll boys in tow, and the three of them made their way down the stairs. Feferi noticed Detective Sikes clocking their ruffled hair and crumpled clothes, and made a note to be careful what she gave away around him.

“So you're here about the firebomb, then?” Eridan said, slumping down carelessly onto a couch as Sollux leaned against the back of Feferi's seat. “About fuckin' time.”

Detective Francisco turned to look at the boy. “First of all, let me assure you that every resource the department has is working to apprehend those responsible for this.”

“Why don't you start with those purist assholes?” Eridan demanded. “It was those fuckin' protesters, that's where it came from.”

The Detectives shared a momentary glance, then Detective Sikes spoke. “Okay, strictly off the record? We have a pretty good idea where to look, the only problem is proof. These guys take off the headgear, dump the hardware, and suddenly they're honest citizens again. So what we need from you is everything you remember about what happened, and hopefully we can find some way to tie them to the crime.” He looked around the room. “Who wants to start?”

“I will,” said Jade, still lying on the floor next to Bec. “Do you want it from when we arrived at the airport?”

“If you would like,” Detective Francisco said, pulling out a pad and pen. “To begin with, which of you were actually present at the time?”

The story came out again, more clearly this time as the detectives guided the retelling with questions. When it came to her turn Feferi found herself giving small details that she hadn't even realized she had noticed in the confusion. Detective Sikes asked most of the questions, with Detective Francisco occasionally breaking in to ask for a clarification or tangent to a point. Both of them seemed taken aback when they learned about Snowman's rescue, and both Doctor Lalonde and Grandpa Harley assured the men that they had not had any other contact with the woman and had no idea what her motives might be beyond the obvious.

“Just be careful around her; she's one bad lady,” Detective Sikes had said, looking at Feferi as he spoke. She had returned his gaze innocuously, remembering how she and Snowman had faced off. Not quite allies and not quite rivals had been the unspoken message. One day they would do battle, each using her power and her influence to try and bring the other down, but for now Snowman was on her side and Feferi knew that within those limits she could be trusted. She did not try to explain that to the detectives, however, instead keeping her smile sweet and her replies simple. She thought that Detective Sikes knew she was holding back, but he didn't push her. Perhaps he was just used to politics, for all that he seemed to be nothing but rough edges.

By the time the interview about the purist attack was over, the two detectives had been accommodated on a couch, and Doctor Lalonde had found them each some coffee before perching herself on the arm of the seat opposite. Sollux had grown impatient with the long wait and started to thread his fingers through Feferi's hair, playing with the long dark strands in a way that was both relaxing and very, very distracting for the Heiress.

“So ith that it? Are you done now?” he demanded as the room fell silent. “Becauthe I don't really thee why I had to come down here for thith collothal wathte of time.”

Feferi gently reached up and grabbed his hand with hers. “They have some other questions, Sol,” she said gently. “About a different case.”

“What, and they couldn't do that firtht and let the retht of uth off the hook?” he snarled, glowering at the two men. Detective Francisco leaned forward, an apologetic expression on his face.

“We felt it would be better to get the more... amicable conversation out of the way first,” he explained.

“Not that we're planning to piss off the upper echelons of tr-Alternian society or anything,” his partner added. Sollux rolled his eyes.

“Whatever,” he sighed. “Jutht get it over with. I have thtuff to do.” His gaze flickered briefly to Eridan, and Feferi wondered how the pair of them had avoided getting caught for so long. She supposed it would just have to be put down to everyone around them being so busy all the time but still, they were so glubbing obvious!

Detective Francisco flicked back several pages in his notebook and cleared his throat. “I suppose if we ask the simple question first... do any of you have any knowledge at all about an indigo-blood named Gamzee Makara, or a mutant red-blood called Karkat Vantas?” He asked in a perfunctory way as if expecting nothing to come of it, but Feferi heard the gasp behind her, felt Sollux's claws dig painfully into her shoulders.

“...KK?” he said, and it was the smallest voice she had heard from him since he first told her about Aradia. Across the room, Eridan's eyes were slowly widening and his teeth bared in a growl.

“What did that fuckin' sopor-brained idiot do?” he hissed. “I fuckin' swear to cod...”

“Thhut up, athwipe,” Sollux snapped, before turning to the detectives. “Ith he alive?”

Detective Sikes, clearly confused, blinked and said, “What?”

“KK!” Sollux yelled. “You're athking uth about him, tho he mutht be alive, right? Unleth...” Feferi felt his fingers clench even tighter and she thought he might actually have drawn blood. “Oh fuck. Tell me you didn't find him dead. Pleathe.” She could hear Sollux's voice cracking and he sounded so pitiful she thought her bladder-based vascular muscle might explode.

“Assuming that KK is Karkat, we haven't found him, no,” Detective Francisco said with a slow, deliberate calmness. “I'm afraid I can't assure you that he's alive, but we have been planning to look for him on the premise that he is. If you have any information that says otherwise...”

Sollux shook his head dumbly. “I... no,” he muttered. “It wath jutht, I kind of didn't have time for anything on the thhip, and I lotht contact with him. I tried to find him when we got here but he wathn't on the internet under hith old handle, tho I jutht athumed...” He broke off and frowned. “Wait, ith he in thome kind of trouble?”

“We hope not,” Detective Sikes said sympathetically. “But it doesn't look good. We've got a witness who thinks that the Ringmaster might be this Gamzee kid, and according to her the last time she saw them Vantas was his moirail.”

“That's a load a fuckin' shit,” Eridan said bluntly. Everyone turned to stare at him and he snorted. “I know Gamzee, okay? I'm the one told him to get his stupid sopor soaked ass on the ship. I don't even know what's less likely; him wantin' ta hurt someone or him actually bein' able ta do it.” He waved a hand absently. “Dumb idiot was a cullin' waitin' to happen, not a diabolical fuckin' mastermind.”

“Wow, Eridan,” Jade said, laughing. “I knew you had it in you to be nice!”

“Nithe my ath,” Sollux sneered. “He wath probably hoping to get pity-pailed by a dethperate junkie.”

“Shut up!” Eridan snapped, flushing purple. “For your information, _Tholluxth,_ I did it becod ewen if he was a landdweller he was from a noble fuckin' lineage and I fuckin' owed him a shot at bein' able to improwe himself!”

“If you two could curtail yourselves for a few seconds, I believe the detectives would like to speak with you,” Kanaya said sternly, causing the room to fall silent. Feferi had almost forgotten she was there, curled up next to Rose in an immaculate scarlet silk nightgown, but when she chose to make her presence felt the jade-blooded troll was very hard to miss. “If I understand correctly, Sollux, you were friends with this Karkat individual and Eridan, you were acquainted with Gamzee, yes?”

The two teenagers nodded like naughty children and Kanaya waved an elegant hand to the detectives. “It seems there is some dispute as to whether your suspect is at all dangerous,” she continued. “Quite unusual for an indigo-blood, but nonetheless I think it would be best if you were to furnish us with a little more evidence of your claim.”

Feferi frowned as the detectives shifted nervously on their couch. Detective Sikes took the opportunity to sip at his cooling coffee, leaving his partner to do the talking.

“That actually brings us to the more general question,” Detective Francisco began, everything about him screaming that he did not actually want to be saying any of this. Feferi felt herself becoming tense again, worrying about what question would come next. “The witness we spoke to made reference to something quite disturbing. She claims that prior to your arrival on Earth, all Alternians were habitually using sopor, and that when your supply ran out...” he paused and glanced down at his notebook, quoting directly from the page. “Everyone went mad. They started killing each other.”

A long silence filled the room, broken only by the quiet ticking of the clock on the mantelpiece. A thousand possible fragments of a lie ran through Feferi's head, explanations and excuses that she had rehearsed because she had known all along that this day had to come. No matter how much they wanted to forget, you couldn't get a quarter of a million people to keep a secret forever.

“I'm sorry,” she said, because it seemed like the only true thing left that she could say.

“Sorry?” Detective Sikes said. “Sorry? Ms Peixes, when your people crashed here you swore to the government, to the press, to the people of this world that you were peaceful. You are living in our cities, in our homes, we are defending you against purists who say you're dangerous and now what? You're telling me that they might be right?”

Feferi opened her mouth and let out a weak glub before Eridan jumped in.

“Don't say nothin', Fef,” he growled. “They ain't got any fuckin' right ta be askin' us about stuff that happened before we ewen set foot on their planet.”

“Eridan, though crude, is correct,” Kanaya agreed. “Whatever may or may not have happened prior to our landing here is out of your jurisdiction and thus none of your concern.”

“That is not true.”

Feferi turned to look at Rose, who had pulled away from Kanaya and was looking at her with deep concern. “Kanaya,” the human girl said gently, “Just because we have no legal authority over these past events does not mean my people will not be affected by them.” She looked around the room, taking in all of the Alternians one by one. “You keep secrets,” she said, startlingly blunt. “All of you. I am your friend and I am your sister and whatever the truth is I will still stand by you, but not if you continue your futile attempts to hide behind bluster and infantile technicalities.” She carefully took Kanaya's hand in her own, slowly and carefully intertwining the fingers to alternate pink and gray. “We have a saying on this world that honesty is the best policy,” she said. “Trite as it may be, in this case I think it is justified.”

“Oh, and what would you know about it, you fuckin' land-dwellin' monkey...” Eridan began.

“STOP!” yelled someone, and when everyone turned to stare Feferi realized it was her. She took a deep breath and returned the confused looks with a steady, regal bearing. She was Feferi Peixes, she was the Heiress, and if she was not dishonest then she could not run from the truth any longer.

“I am responsible for the lives of two hundred and fifty thousand Alternians,” she said calmly, forcing her voice to stay soft and even. “That was my ship, detectives, and everyone who got on board did so trusting in my plan. I already let too many of them down on the journey, and I can't, I won't, do the same here at the destination. I want you to promise me that there won't be any legal trouble here and now for things that happened before our arrival, and that everything I say to you here is in the strictest confidence.” She was glad now of the practice she had got speaking formally to humans, glad that she could avoid fish puns and keep her glubs to a few emphatic punctuations when she needed to.

“As long as you understand, Ms Peixes, that crimes committed here on Earth may have their roots in prior history or inclination.” Detective Francisco was no less serious, no less studiously controlled. “We cannot ignore evidence that pertains to a real and present danger to the people of this world, human or Alternian.”

Feferi nodded once, sharply, and steeled herself. “In that case, detective, I'll admit I lied when I said we were harmless. You must have suspected as much already, in your line of work.” The two men were not so crass as to nod, but Feferi could see the ghosts of one too many violent Alternian perpetrators flicker across their faces before she continued, gray cheeks slowly flushing Tyrian purple. “The truth is that Alternia was and most likely still is a dangerous, violent place. Any of my people could tell you that there are no adults on our homeworld. They were banished to lower the danger of violent rebellion centuries ago.” She leaned forwards, looking to the ground and then forcing her gaze back up again. “I'm not sure it's even possible for a human to imagine a society where children are abandoned by their elders, where the very idea of an adult is a fearful one, given how much you care for your offspring.”

“We're cops,” Detective Sikes said, his voice dark and bitter. “We've seen enough human scumbags that we can scale it up some.”

Feferi nodded. “I- that is, we were hoping that those of us who left could be different,” she said. “That wherever we ended up, we could find a better way of living together.” She hoped that the listening humans- all of them, not just the two detectives- could hear the sincerity in her words. “I lied because even after everything that happened I still had faith it was possible, and if anything that faith is stronger now than it was then. Earth has been good to us and good for us; please, you have to believe that!”

“I do,” said a gentle voice, and Feferi looked over at Grandpa Harley to meet his sincere gaze. On the arm of his chair Doctor Lalonde's lips were pressed into a tight line, and she gave a single terse nod before knocking back the rest of her drink in one swig.

“So what did happen?” asked Detective Francisco. He still sounded calm and collected, but Feferi noted that his partner seemed to be turning redder with every passing second. Honesty was now the only policy, but this was outside Feferi's expertise. Helpless, she turned to Kanaya, who smoothly took over the burden of response.

“Alternians are prone to nightmares,” she told the listening ears of the room. “And many of us, in particular those with cooler chroma, often struggle with violent impulses. Whether these problems are a result of our upbringing or a flaw in our species remains to be seen, but on our homeworld the use of sopor slime to help quell the most extreme manifestations was universal.”

“And I know what you're thinkin', but most of us didn't eat it,” Eridan interrupted. “You'd hawe to a been a complete rot-pan to ewen think a that back then.”

“So how did you use it?” Doctor Lalonde asked, nothing but scientific curiosity in her voice.

“We slept in it,” Kanaya replied calmly. “It is intended for absorption through the skin, which is why oral consumption has never been advisable. At any rate, when we stocked the ship we included production and recycling facilities for it, considering it to be just as vital to our survival as food or water.”

“But your supply ran out?” Detective Francisco prompted. Feferi nodded awkwardly.

“We didn't have enough people for the crew,” she explained. “And the number of people on the ship... there was no way to screen everyone who came aboard!”

“... didn't ewen fuckin' try...” Eridan muttered. Feferi pointedly ignored him.

“We could barely keep things clam at the best of times,” she said, fighting to keep her voice even against the weight of memories. “We controlled the supplies but it was all we could do to distribute them fairly. There were some power plays, some sabotage, and... we lost the sopor production facility.” She glubbed miserably and felt Sollux's hand squeeze her own over her shoulder. “We kept the supply going for a while using the recyclers, but things broke all the time on the ship, and when they went down there was nothing we could do.”

“What happened then?” the detective asked. Feferi glubbed again while Kanaya developed a sudden interest in the hem of her nightgown. Eridan curled his lip in disgust.

“Oh, for fuck's sake,” he snapped. “If you're gonna spill the beans at least don't go and wriggle out halfway through.” He folded his arms defiantly. “What the fuck you think happened? Half a million troll kids who suddenly gotta handle all their own aggression and instincts and shit, all rammed in together on the same fuckin' tin can?” He grimaced. “And a course, you don't gotta eat that shit to get addicted, so we were all in fuckin' withdrawal too. So naturally we all had a happy fuckin' flower party to celebrate our new-found friendship and understandin' of one another.”

“And then?” Detective Sikes said suddenly, looking- no, glaring- straight at Feferi. “Obviously you stopped the riots somehow, but the ones who killed people, the murderers, what happened to them?”

Feferi swallowed. “Define murderer,” she said. Sikes' frown grew deeper and she waved her hands in desperation. “You don't urchinstand! It's not simple like that! Some people eely went mad and some people just pretended to and some people culled to defend themselves or other people and some people were dugonging up on anyone they thought might be a threat!” She paused, chest heaving. “What were we supposed to do?” she asked, feeling tears prick at the corners of her eyes. “Most of us left Alternia to get away from being culled, we couldn't just start getting rid of people because they were inconvenient!”

“How many?”

“We dealt with the ones we had to,” Feferi told them, pleading. “We made sure the rest understood.”

“How many of you are killers?” Detective Sikes insisted. Feferi looked at the carpet, its pale violet fibers kept so carefully clean, and remembered with a hollow feeling why she had started lying in the first place.

“One-third to three-quarters,” she whispered. “I don't know any better than that. I'm sorry, I'm so sorry...”

Sollux wrapped his arms around her, brought his cheek down to touch her head, and it felt so good to feel his pulse beat against her skin that she leaned back into him. Kanaya hadn't moved, but Rose's knuckles were white where their hands were gripping, and Eridan had pulled his knees up to wrap his arms tight around them. The clock ticked patiently on the mantlepiece.

“That's a lot of people,” Detective Francisco said quietly, and Feferi could see the question behind his eyes. She recognized it because it was the question she always saw her people thinking, every time they met each other- _would you have killed me, or would I have killed you?_ It didn't look any better on a human face, but it was infinitely preferable to the frozen look Detective Sikes was wearing.

“Excuse me,” he said, and without waiting for an answer he got up and charged out of the front door, almost flattening the surprised chauffeur who had stepped out to smoke on the doorstep after telling his story to the police. The front door swung closed and a second later Feferi nearly jumped out of her chair when a loud wordless holler of pure rage echoed from the other side. The only one who didn't seem startled was Detective Francisco, who stood almost as rapidly as his partner had done and nodded to the room.

“I apologize,” he said. “Give us a moment.” He followed his partner outside, and everyone else fell back into uncomfortable silence punctuated only by one very loud half of an indistinguishable argument outside.

“So,” said Grandpa Harley after a short while. “It seems that you youngsters have not been entirely forthcoming with us.” He peered sternly at Feferi. “I had thought we were allies in this,” he admonished. Feferi flushed and was about to speak when Sollux cut in.

“Leave her alone!” he hissed at the surprised man. “Thee's been working her athe off for uth and thith thit ith in the patht. Thee thouldn't have to deal with it now!”

“It's not his fault!” Jade objected, levering herself up off Bec indignantly. “He didn't accuse her of anything, and I don't think it's fair that we learned about this because of some strangers when our friends should have _trusted_ us...”

“What kind a fuckin' reason we got to do somethin' that ridiculous? It's not like it's any a your fuckin' business anyway!” Eridan yelled, and suddenly the whole room was yelling right back. Feferi looked in horror as Jade and Eridan started to verbally rip into each other, each defending their own; Rose and Kanaya both tried to intervene and suddenly found themselves at cross purposes over their friends' manners, Bec was growling at Sollux who was screaming obscenities at Grandpa Harley, and Doctor Lalonde was mechanically filling and refilling her glass from a rapidly emptying decanter.

“Shut up, shut up, SHUT UP!” Feferi screamed, just as the door opened and the two stunned Detectives saw her leap to her feet, quivering with rage. As stunned silence fell she pointed a single accusative finger at Eridan.

“You, shut up!” she screeched. “I am carpable of dolphinding myself!” She wheeled on Sollux, finger switching to her new target. “And you! How _dare_ you be so rude to Grandpa!”

The boy managed to stutter out something that might have been an apology as she rounded on Jade. “You as well! You _know_ Eridan is a complete guppy! I expected you at least to have some _self-coral_!”

She turned back to scowl at Rose and Kanaya, who were already looking sheepish, then moved on to Doctor Lalonde, snatching the decanter and the glass right out of her hands and slamming them onto the table. “That is not the way to handle this!” she yelled. Finally, fury still burning, she turned to face Grandpa Harley, balling her hands into tight fists by her sides.

“I am grateful for everything you have done for me and my people,” she said, forcing herself to be polite and hearing the growl in her voice nonetheless. “But they are my people, not yours. You are my ally, not my consort, and I don't have to shell you a glubbing thing unless I want to!” She stared at him, chest heaving and gills fluttering uselessly in the air as a small voice inside her started to scream that she really, really didn't want to do what she had just done. Behind it, an even smaller voice chuckled warmly and suggested that perhaps she really, really ought to do that more often.

“Violent impulses, huh?” said Detective Sikes from the doorway. Feferi spun to glare at him and he raised his hands, palm outwards. “Woah, there!”

“I think what Detective Sikes is trying to say is that you seem to be controlling your instincts fairly well, considering,” Detective Francisco said. Slowly he walked forward, only to stop a few feet away from Feferi and hold out his hand. “It has been a pleasure, Miss Peixes.”

Slowly her fist unfolded, and gently she put her hand in his, let him shake it and noticed how he didn't even wipe off the smear of royal Tyrian blood she left on his palm.

“I am sorry we couldn't be more kelp,” she said, and she meant it. She really did.

“On the contrary, you have been very helpful indeed,” Detective Francisco told her with a smile. “Is there anything we can do- other than catch your attackers, obviously.”

Feferi didn't even have to think or look back at Sollux. “Let us know if- when- you find them,” she said. “Please.”

The detective nodded, not having to ask who she meant, and started to head for the door when Eridan spoke, quietly and looking away from the humans at the fireplace. “Wait.”

The detectives paused and Eridan continued. “Gamzee's lineage- I tracked him down 'cause a his ancestor bein' the Grand Highblood.”

Feferi let out a gasp and her former moirail nodded. “Yeah, that Grand Highblood. Guy was a fuckin' legend back on Alternia,” he explained to the two confused policemen. “Deadliest subjugglator what ever lived is what they reckon. Must a culled thousands. Hundreds a thousands. Anyway, everyone who isn't a fuckin' lowblood idiot knows that you're basically identical to your ancestor, so however you turn out... “ he trailed off. “I always figured Makara must a lost his way somewhere,” he finished glumly.

Detective Francisco looked at his partner, who just shrugged. “Thank you,” he said carefully. The two men walked out of the house, the door clicking softly shut behind them, and once again there was silence. Then Grandpa Harley slowly stood up, walked across the room, and to Feferi's everlasting surprise hugged her. His other arm reached out to Jade, who walked over to be crushed in the enveloping embrace.

“I am so proud of you,” he whispered with a shaking voice. “My two brave girls.” He carefully placed a kiss on top of each of their heads, and looked over at Eridan, still sat on a chair. “And my brave boy, too,” he said, smiling even though his eyes were leaking strange, colorless human tears.

As Feferi leaned into his side, she saw Doctor Lalonde gathering Sollux into a similar hold and moving closer to Rose and Kanaya, who added her to their chain of discreet hand-holding. Feferi met the bichromatic eyes of her red crush, and shared a small quirk of a smile with him. Humans were strange sometimes with their family thing; Feferi had long since decided that the only rational thing to do was treat it as some sort of fifth romance type, one where you were all moirails and auspistices and friends and enemies at the same time.

The important thing was that now she knew, without any doubt or fear, that she was family to these humans, and that they would stand by her through anything. It was more than she could have dared to hope for, in the faraway time when she had been a princess dreaming of freedom and safety. By comparison, the next few steps should be easy, and yet she had never been more glad to know she had such stalwart companions at her side.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Heya! Chapter!
> 
> So, I was wondering- does anyone else have the problem where they use British English but decided to write in American English (or vice versa) because they got sick of fighting with the spellchecker in pesterlogs and also over words like "sidewalk", and have now lost the ability to spell words like "realise/realize" or "colour/color" on the first attempt, regardless of the version of the language being attempted?
> 
> Herp derp derp! :)


	11. ==> Be The Kindhearted Nervous, Um, Paraplegic?

### CHAPTER TEN ==> Be The Kindhearted Nervous, Um, Paraplegic?

Tavros Nitram was expecting to wake up early but was surprised to hear the house so quiet when he did. George was an early riser no matter how late he went to bed and Susan tended to get up at the same time as her husband. Emily never stayed in bed for long after other people were up either, so except for Buck the mornings tended to be bustling as the Francisco family got themselves ready for the day.

Telling himself that he was just being stupid and that it was only quiet because he had got up earlier than usual, Tavros reached out and dragged his wheelchair a little closer to the bed. It had been worth learning to sleep on a flat platform in exchange for the ease with which he pulled himself into the device, leaving in his wake a tangled mess of comforters and sheets and blankets that made a reasonable approximation of a pile. He contemplated the mess that his sleeping arrangements had made and felt a pang of guilt. Susan always arranged it so neatly for him, but he could never work out how to get it all to lie flat and often made it look worse instead of helping when he tried. It still felt wrong to just leave it, so he cautiously leaned in to neaten the top near the pillows. There was a clatter as he knocked his tumbler of water onto the carpet; fortunately it was nearly empty, and what little fluid there was missed the power socket. Tavros leaned awkwardly out of his chair to pick it up and took such care with his overlarge horns that he barked his shoulder on the bedside table as he straightened. He rubbed absently at the patch of scraped skin then, giving up on any further tidying, wheeled himself carefully out of the door. A glance down the stairs showed that there was nobody visible at the bottom. In theory he should be able to get himself and his chair down safely, but in practice he still hadn't got the hang of it and it was probably a bad idea to take the risk. Occasionally he still missed the ramps he had painstakingly added to his hive on Alternia.

Rather than wake anyone, Tavros moved himself over to the bathroom and started his morning ablutions. The Franciscos had got a special tub shortly after adopting him that he could get himself in and out of easily, but it still took time to manage the dead weight of his legs. As he washed his hair with apple-scented slime that smelled almost edible but definitely, definitely wasn't, he hummed softly and reminded himself how lucky he was to be living with such a caring human family. If only Tinkerbull could have been there with him- but his tiny lusus hadn't been able to leave when he did. He had made it clear that Tavros was to go without him, which hadn't made it much easier.

Vriska had told him on the ship that Tinkerbull was probably dead by now without Tavros to look after him, and even though Terezi had said not to listen to her Tavros thought she had secretly agreed. He preferred to think that his lusus had gone back to the brooding caverns and found another wiggler. That would be better for Tinkerbull, after all, even if it made Tavros' blood-pusher hurt to think that he might have been replaced so easily.

When he returned to his bedroom, clean and dripping and wrapped in a towel robe, he was surprised to see George and Susan sitting on his bed waiting for him. They were oddly stiff, their faces blank and calm; he stopped opposite them, folding his fingers nervously as George got up and closed the door.

“Tavros, we need to talk,” the human man said, and the young troll swallowed.

“Um, okay?” he replied cautiously. No, that was stupid. He should be more confident, even if George was being all weird and cold like he was with Buck when he came home late and Susan was looking at him like- like-

He didn't even know that expression, and that made him even more uncertain. But these were the Franciscos, and they loved him, and he told himself that and pulled his shoulders back to sit upright instead of slouching in his chair. “Um, what do you want, to talk about, Dad?” he asked, enjoying the sound of the human word. Dad. It was a safe, protecting sort of word. He liked having a Dad, even one that was currently angry with him.

“I heard some things at work last night,” George said, taking a seat on the bed beside Susan and placing his hand over her own. “And we would like to ask you some questions.” He paused awkwardly for a second, then continued evenly. “About what happened on the ship.”

Tavros froze. His eyes went wide as he stared at his human parents and his mouth opened and closed a few times as he tried and failed to find words.

“Tavros, we need to hear the truth,” Susan said slowly, and now he knew what it was he could see in her face. She was afraid. Of him. Tavros wanted to reach out to her, wanted to tell her that it was all okay and he would never, ever hurt her or her family, but what if she didn't believe him? He didn't know if he could take that.

“Mum...” he said, eyes filling with brown tears. He liked having a Mum, too. He liked a lot of things about having a human family and until that exact moment he had thought they liked him too. Part of him dizzily noted how completely unfair it was that he had fled his home on Alternia because he wasn't enough of a troll, and now he might lose his home on Earth because he was too much of one. Most of him was screaming to just tell them what they wanted to hear, but he had no idea what that was, so instead he hung his head and said in the quietest voice he had ever heard himself use; “I... just, um, just, I... ask me, um, anything?”

There was silence for a few endless seconds. “You got on the ship to escape being culled on Alternia,” George said, his voice still chillingly level. Tavros almost wished he would shout like he did at Buck; it would have been easier if he was that sort of angry. “We always knew that and we never pushed for details you didn't want to share. But from what I heard tonight, the ship wasn't much better.” The human man paused to drum his fingers nervously on his leg. “Tavros, we know about the sopor, and what happened when the supply was interrupted, and we have to know...”

“Did you kill anyone?” Susan interrupted, and Tavros' tears spilled over as he shook his head violently side to side, telling them no, no, no. He had never been so glad to be weak, never been so relieved that he was too soft and useless to even defend himself properly, and through the brown smear in his eyes he could see that Susan was crying too. George had his eyes closed and was exhaling a long drawn-out sigh, his shoulders visibly relaxing from a tense line. Some of the ugly chill seemed to lift from the room. Tavros looked at his parents and realized that they were just that- his parents, and they had just heard what they needed to hear for that to be true. The sense of sheer relief overwhelmed the odd, twisted, sullen feeling the realization put in his belly. He was going to be fine. They were going to work this out.

Not that everything was all right just yet. George was still frowning and Susan's mouth was drawn into a tight line, and they were both still giving him a look that said _you had better have a good explanation for this, young man_. Tavros looked nervously back at them and waited for the next question. It wasn't long coming.

“How did you survive?” George asked, his voice a little sterner yet somehow more comforting. Less like a policeman interrogating a suspect, and more like a father confronting his wayward child.

Tavros stared at the ground and answered honestly. “Terezi.” He glanced back up and saw that it wasn't enough. “She, um, she kept a lot of people safe,” he added hopefully.

“How?” George asked. Tavros picked at a loose thread on his towel robe.

“She, er, kind of had this, zone? This, um, territory on the ship?” he explained, pausing to think as he spoke. “She said, nobody, uh, breaks the rules here. And she, she didn't let them- I mean, she used to, um, throw people out? If they didn't behave.” He shuddered. “And when, when the sopor ran out, she said, the rule is keep the, um, the chaos out there. And I stayed inside.”

George leaned forwards. “So nothing happened where you were?” He sounded almost hopeful, but Tavros knew that lying would be wrong even if it was easy. He shook his head.

“No. Um. There were some, people,” he stammered. “Not, not many. Terezi, she, she, um, she kept us safe.” He tapped his claws on the arm of his wheelchair. “We built a barricade,” he said. “But that, doesn't work, if they're already inside?”

His father nodded grimly as if that was exactly what he'd been expecting to hear, but Susan shuddered a little. She leaned forwards, studied Tavros' face. He had never seen her look so unhappy and a small pang of guilt prodded him because it was his fault she felt this way.

“It's, um, it's okay,” he reassured her, desperate to fix whatever it was he had done. “It was, um, it was just a short time, really. And I didn't, um, I didn't really, see anything?”

Susan smiled gently as she brought up a hand to brush at Tavros' damp hair. “It's not just that one time, sweetie,” she told him sadly. “First your homeworld, and then you were in that place for three years, and it all just sounds...” she broke off and shook her head. Her hand dropped down, landing in her alien son's and holding it comfortingly. “What was it like?”

Tavros squeezed her hand and shrugged, confused. “Um, I don't know,” he said slowly. “I guess, I never really, uh, thought about it?” He chewed on his lip. “It was... I mean, uh, there were loads, of people, worse off than me, so I was just... I don't know?”

“We want to hear about what happened to you,” George said, and his voice didn't sound angry at all now. It sounded warm and worried and no less determined because of it. Tavros looked at them both then took a deep breath, because he really hadn't thought about it in years and he didn't really want to. But if it would stop them being afraid of him, afraid for him, then he would. It was easier to remember with his eyes closed, keeping the now-familiar brightness of Earth at bay and filling the darkness behind his eyelids with gray walls and mesh ceilings and the constant hum of the engines...

“I was lucky,” he said, letting his memories drift into focus and his audience fade away. “There were, um, lots of us, and, uh, barely enough, of anything.” It was easy to remember small things, like how the ship had been freezing cold unless you were next to machinery that stank of metal and ozone- or in a populated area, heated by the proximity of hundreds and thousands of other warm bodies. “I, um, I don't think there were enough 'coons, for sleeping?” he said, elaborating because they were still just sitting there, waiting, and he felt that the silence was too much. “And the food, it was all rationed, and there, uh, should have been, just enough.” He paused because just enough wasn't the same as not being hungry, but they didn't really need to know that, did they? “Some places, that, uh, didn't really work so well. But I was, um, with Terezi. She made sure, everyone in her zone, they got their ration.”

“So that's it?” Susan asked, sounding surprised. “You just waited, for all that time?”

Tavros shook his head. “No,” he replied. “I, er, kept busy.”

“Doing what?” George wanted to know. Tavros opened his eyes and glanced at the cards lying on the bedside table. George followed his eye-line and raised his eyebrows. “Pokemon?”

Tavros shrugged, trying to hide the growing grin that was threatening to overtake his face. “Fiduspawn,” he corrected. “It's, uh, basically, similar? Only, with more actual, um, monsters, I guess.”

“And you played it on the ship?” Susan asked. There was no stopping the smile now; Tavros sat up in his wheelchair, swelling with pride because before he got to Earth, before he became their son, this had been the first thing in his life he had ever been indisputably good at.

“I, played all the, time,” he said. “We used to, um, make bets? And there were some, uh, tournaments. Pretty big ones?” He looked between his human parents. “I, er, won,” he told them. “Nearly every game.”

George and Susan looked at each other, seemingly bemused but far, far, happier than they had been five minutes earlier.

“Well,” George said slowly, looking at Tavros with fond amusement. “Of all the things I thought I might hear, you being the ship-wide champion card hustler was not what I was expecting.” The man slid forwards off the bed, arms that were strong for a human wrapping around Tavros and gathering him into a tight hug. A second pair of arms, slimmer and softer, enveloped Tavros from the other side as Susan joined them. The boy concentrated on staying still so as not to accidentally bash them with his unwieldy horns and accepted the embrace, confused but happy.

“I, um, that is,” he muttered as they pulled back a few minutes later. “Thank you,” he managed. George gently rested a hand on top of his head and looked at him with uncharacteristic gentleness, while Susan mopped tears from Tavros' face with an increasingly mud-colored handkerchief.

“Thank you, Tavros,” she said, smiling even though her cheeks were shining with the funny clear tears that humans had. She leaned over and kissed his forehead gently. “We love you.”

“We certainly do,” George agreed, heading for the door. “I'm going to call Matt. Susan, why don't you help Tavros get some breakfast before his friends arrive?”

Susan nodded then turned into a blur of motherly motion, digging out some of Tavros' nicest casual clothes from the closet and helping him wrestle them on over his horns. The whole time she was chatting, asking him about school and his lessons with the Rabbi and how she had never realized he was so into his card games, maybe she should look up Pokemon tournaments on the internet, would he like that...

It was weird. Not bad or anything, just strange; she was smiling but she kept putting her hand on his arm or hugging him as if to reassure herself that he was still there and real. Tavros returned her smiles with his own slightly nervy grin, not quite certain what the matter was or how to make things better but sure that things could have been so much worse. It got a little easier after they made it downstairs and Emily joined him at the kitchen table, waiting as Susan furiously beat at the waffle mix.

“Is something wrong with Mum?” Emily whispered to Tavros, leaning across the table. He shrugged helplessly.

George joined them, a pajama-clad Buck in tow, just as the syrup was being added to the plates. The human teenager looked like he wanted to complain about being dragged out of bed so early during the summer, but something about the odd atmosphere in the house must have got through to him because he ate in silence, shoveling mouthfuls in one after the other until Susan snapped at him to chew his food.

The tense silence snapped like a plastic ruler and suddenly things were just like normal again, Susan smiling and George serious and Buck sulking as Tavros and Emily conspired to make a pair of waffle landscapes complete with syrup rivers. Breakfast was considerably messier than it had any right to be, and Tavros was just finishing clean-up of the sticky patina he had helped put on the table when the doorbell rang. Susan looked up from supervising by the sink and gave him a wink.

“I think I can finish that up,” she said. Tavros nodded happily and wheeled himself out into the corridor, opening the door as George stepped out of the living room. Outside stood a young blond human man in an orange baseball cap and the most pointy pair of shades Tavros had ever seen on someone who wasn't Terezi.

“'Sup,” he said. Tavros smiled meekly back.

“... hi,” he said. George walked up to stand next to him and peered out of the door.

“Hello, Dirk,” he said to the other man. “It's been a while. Have you been well?”

“Yeah, I've been awesome, as usual,” Dirk Strider said, a slight Texan drawl still coloring his speech. “Kiddo here all ready to roll?”

George looked down at Tavros, who nodded. He looked back at Strider. “Have to say, I was expecting Terezi or Dave to come to the door?”

“Yeah, well.” Strider shrugged, nonchalant as he glanced back at the car idling in the road. “'Rezi said it was probably better if she stayed back? Some family shit or somethin'. Dave's staying with her.”

George nodded slowly. “I understand,” he said. “But tell her from me that she is still welcome here, and we are glad for everything she's done for our family.”

Strider nodded. “Sure, I'll pass that on,” he agreed. “C'mon, kid. Places to be.”

Tavros hesitated and looked back at the kitchen. George smiled.

“Give us a minute,” he said to Strider. The other man nodded, and George vanished back into the house, returning a minute later with Susan. She crouched down and gave Tavros another warm hug and a soft peck on the cheek. Tavros wrapped his arms around her neck and hugged back, not even caring that the sardonic gaze of Dave's Bro never wavered from the saccharine family portrait. He could take a little teasing for this.

“Take care,” George said as Tavros reluctantly separated from Susan. Tavros nodded and followed his baseball-hatted guide out down the drive to the second hand people-carrier that Cathy had invested in when it became apparent she would be providing transport to not only her daughter but her daughter's friends on a semi-regular basis. All of the car doors were open, Terezi sitting with her legs dangling out of the door while Dave leaned on the trunk. They both looked over as he approached, two pairs of impassable sunglasses masking the eyes of his friends.

“Hey, Tav,” Dave said, giving him a barely perceptible nod. “How's it hangin'?”

Tavros grinned. “It's, uh, hanging okay?” he said. Dave snorted and shoved him gently in the shoulder.

“Dork,” he said, without malice. Tavros ignored him and wheeled himself over to the free rear door, starting to awkwardly maneuver himself into the middle seat, leaning his head back onto the shelf to make room for his horns. Dave strolled around after him as Terezi tugged herself back inside the car.

“Hey, Tavros!” she said, leering from ear to ear. Tavros smiled at her.

“Hi, Terezi,” he replied, pulling his legs into the car. Dave waited until they were out the way and grabbed the wheelchair.

“Just gonna get this stowed,” he said, dragging it back towards the trunk. “Hey, Bro, pop it!”

As the two humans were occupied at the back of the car, Terezi leaned in and whispered; “So did you get the third degree yet?”

Tavros didn't have to ask what she meant. “Uh, yeah,” he said, keeping his voice low. “They were, um, pretty upset? But then, I told them everything, and they, er, stopped being mad with me.” He paused. “How, um, did it go, for you?”

If he hadn't known her better he could have sworn that Terezi looked downcast. “Matt was furious last night,” she said. “Cathy calmed him down so they could both listen to me, though, and then they both said that I'd done nothing really wrong.” She looked thoughtful for a moment. “Cathy even said that she was proud of what I'd managed.”

Tavros smiled uncertainly, eyes rolled uncomfortably to the side to look at his friend. “That's, um, that's good, right?”

Terezi nodded. “Yeah.” She absently tugged the seat-belt over to her mouth and licked it. “But she didn't make pancakes this morning.”

“Oh.” Tavros stared uncomfortably at the roof. “Um. I'm sure, she'll come around?”

“Yeah,” Terezi said dully, and that was all there was to say before the trunk closed with a bang and Dave was swinging into the passenger seat as his Bro climbed in the driver's side.

“Oh, yeah,” the older human said, twisting around to look at Terezi. “Message from the Big Man up in the house.” He nodded towards Tavros' home. “He says thanks and you can stop by any time, or some shit like that.”

Terezi turned her head to Tavros, who nodded awkwardly and then remembering her blindness said; “Uh... yeah.” Dave looked between the three of them, clearly trying not to show how curious he was about whatever was going on. Tavros considered filling him in, but decided that if Terezi wanted to keep it quiet he could respect that. Instead he made sure that his seat-belt was fastened, because he knew from past experience that he was going to want it soon.

His expectations were soon met. Message delivered, Bro slammed the car into reverse and didn't bother turning; looking over one shoulder, he drove backwards down the road until they reached the main street. Without pausing he swung out onto the nearly empty road and sped off forwards, heedless of the angry car horns behind him. Tavros fought to stop his claws from digging into the car seat; behind him, Terezi was cackling like a madwoman, and Dave was somehow keeping perfect balance without his seat-belt at all.

“So, what is your John friend like?” Terezi asked Dave as they hit a main road and slowed down. Marginally.

“Yeah, real subtle,” Dave snorted. “Sorry, 'Rezi. I ain't spoiling the surprise. I want to see the looks on all your faces when you meet for the first time. Thought you of all people would appreciate the absolute primal fuckin' chaos I'm going for here.”

“Um, can't you tell us, er, anything?” Tavros pleaded, looking between his friends, Bro in the rear-view mirror, and the alarmingly blurry surroundings whizzing past. Dave seemed to consider the request.

“Well, since he knows you're aliens, I guess I can let slip that he's a complete derp,” the human boy drawled. “And he's probably gonna get geek all over you, even though I told him not to.”

“Dave, derp is not a word,” Terezi said disapprovingly. “Your information lacks substance!”

“Derp is too a word,” Dave replied. “It's in the dictionary, right next to a huge fuckin' picture of John's face. That shit is points in the bag in scrabble, am I right Tav?”

Tav chewed his lip nervously. “I, uh, think that Terezi might be right on this one?” he said querulously. “I, I don't think, I ever heard, um, anyone else say it?” He fiddled with his fingers. “Sorry.”

“Et tu, Brute?” Dave said. “Seriously, Tav, you gotta be going all Judas in my shit? Derp is a word, man. You two're just ganging up on me because you're both jealous of my magnificent Strider swag. Gonna hafta nail me to a crucifix and martyr me to the cause on this one.”

Terezi chuckled. “I am not an expert in your human religions, but I believe that was blasphemy. You are a blasphemous heretic, Dave.”

“He'd fuckin' better be,” Bro said, making everyone jump slightly. “Pretty sure that's how I raised him.”

“I'll be sure and thank you when I get burned at the stake by an angry mob,” Dave replied. Bro ignored him.

The rest of the car ride passed in a similar fashion, a constant stream of borderline nonsensical banter between Dave and Terezi punctuated by occasional requests for support. Even though it was all just in fun Tavros tried to stay neutral between his friends, unwilling to take sides, and they responded by failing to make him the target of their barbs. It was comfortable and familiar and by the time they swerved into the airport parking lot and stopped diagonally across two spaces, the unpleasantness of earlier was far at the back of Tavros’ mind.

It took hardly any time for Tavros to get back into his wheelchair, and then the four of them ambled into the airport building proper. It took some scrutiny of the arrivals to find John’s plane, and since they were easily an hour early they set up camp on a section of hard metal benches. Bro leaned back and with a single warning not to “freak security the fuck out” seemed to go to sleep.

The hour seemed to drag by. At first they talked more bullshit, but that soon grew old with all three of them casting occasional glances towards the gates, even though they _knew_ it was too early still for the plane to have arrived. Dave tried to break up the waiting by going and getting three large, overpriced drinks to keep them hydrated. Tavros slurped cautiously at his and watched as Terezi and Dave started competing to toss ice-cubes at innocent passers-by without getting caught. More than a few angry travelers glared or swore at them, but the pair ran out of ammunition before they could draw any more serious attention. Not that they were exactly inconspicuous as it was: the LA natives were unfazed, but more than a few new arrivals were openly gawping at the only trolls in the airport. Tavros turned a rich peanut brown when he heard a small child asking, “Mommy? Are those devils?”

Terezi’s ears had perked up at that and she had leaned over the back of the seat to treat the small human to her toothiest smile. “We are what devils get scared of, little wiggler,” she told it, waggling her eyebrows dramatically. The child squeaked in a sort of delighted fear and was hastily dragged off by its disturbed parent. Terezi sank back down behind the seat and received a fist bump from Dave for her trouble, Tavros grinning weakly at the pair of them before boredom set back in. When the time listed on the arrival board rolled around, fifteen minutes later than the original advertised, they were playing an involved game of “I Spy”. It was complicated by Terezi smelling rather than seeing the room and Dave making all of his choices bizarre, obscene, or both. Tavros had successfully blushed his way through S for “silicone boob-job” and was just trying to think of a less mundane way to describe a baggage carousel when a teenage boy with messy black hair and a suitcase almost as big as he was started lurching towards them. He spared a hand to wave enthusiastically and Dave responded by lifting his fingers in a small gesture. Terezi’s head snapped towards the boy.

“Is this him?” she asked, not waiting for an answer before she leapt to her feet and charged straight over to the stranger. He yelped as she licked his cheek, but the huge grin plastered across his face didn’t vanish.

“Eww! Gross!” he laughed. “You must be Terezi! Dave told me you lick.”

“He did?” Terezi said, pouting as she turned back to the seats. “Dave, you are guilty of perjury. You said he knew nothing about us! I demand recompense for your deception!”

Dave shrugged. “Hey, he was kinda freaking out. I didn’t want him to flip his shit.” He got to his feet and walked to within arm’s length of John, holding out a fist for a bro-bump. “Hey, Egbert.”

John regarded the fist for a moment, then dropped the handle of his wheeled suitcase and enthusiastically threw his arms around Dave. “Hi, Dave!” he managed through his rippling laughter. Tavros laughed too, because Dave had frozen like a statue under the unexpected assault, and even Bro had stopped pretending to sleep in order to fix his blank stare on the newcomer.

After a few long, hilarious moments the dark-haired human let go of his friend and caught sight of Tavros hovering behind him. “Oh, are you Dave’s friend too?” he asked, beaming. “Tavros, right?”

“Uh, yeah...” Tavros began, but he didn’t get any further before John was in front of him, hand sticking out ready to shake. Tavros had been around humans long enough that he automatically began to reach for it, and was surprised when Dave came out of nowhere to grab John's arm. Even through sunglasses Tavros could tell he was glaring.

“What?” John asked innocently. He raised both of his hands and showed them to Dave, front and back. “Best behavior, you said!”

Terezi cackled. “He said that to me, too!” She schooled her mad grin into a stern poker face. “Don’t be licking my bro, ‘Rezi,” she said in a reasonable approximation of Dave’s Texan twang. John laughed, a bright belly laugh that rang in the air and almost made the world around him shine with joy. Tavros found himself smiling just to keep up.

“So you’re in a wheelchair?” John said. “Dave didn’t mention that. Oh, wait, is that a bad thing to bring up? I’m sorry.” He tilted his head. “Your horns are really big, aren’t they?”

“Um, yeah,” Tavros managed, but John was already turning to Terezi.

“I like your glasses!” he said. “And your cane... whoa, wait, are you blind?” He waved a hand in front of her eyes and like lightning she had grabbed his wrist. With a slasher smile that a thousand horror movie monsters would be proud of, she slowly stuck her tongue out and drew it across his palm, snickering as he squealed and tried to pull his hand back.

“Blind as an earth bat,” she said cheerfully. “But I think you taste _sumptuous_.”

John yelped and tugged, and Tavros couldn’t believe his eyes because Dave was actually smiling. “I warned you, dude,” he said calmly. “I warned you about the crazy troll chick.”

“Yeah, you did,” John agreed, still grinning as Terezi released his hand. “And, uh, it’s just great to see you!” He beamed and stuck his hand out again, this time to Dave. Cautiously, the other boy took it. Tavros heard a faint buzzing noise and saw Dave jump backwards. John doubled over in laughter and held his hand up again, revealing a small device in his palm that definitely hadn’t been there before.

“Oh, I got you,” he crowed. “I got you so good!”

Dave was flushing a dangerous shade of angry pink, but before he could respond Bro’s slim hand fell on his shoulder. “Hey, if you kids are done playin’ at world’s freakiest sideshow, how about we get movin’? Got places to go, right squirt?”

John perked up. “Are we going somewhere?” he asked. “I mean, obviously we’re going somewhere, but I mean are we going somewhere special and not just back to yours, not that your place isn’t special...”

“Egbert,” Dave said, face sliding back into cool calmness. “Be chill, man.”

“Sorry, Dave,” John said, not looking sorry in the least.

“As it happens,” the blond boy continued. “We have a full program of entertainment for you today, courtesy of how we live in the same fuckin’ timezone so there’s no way you were getting jet-lagged.” He waved a hand towards the parking lot. “Your slightly borrowed carriage awaits, and I am your fairy godmother. You are going to the ball, John Egbert. Pumpkin carriages, glass slippers, sappy romantic endings, we got the whole nine yards.”

“I do not know this story, Dave,” Terezi said. Dave raised an eyebrow, visible over his aviators.

“Yeah, well, you and Tav’re probably the ugly sisters anyway,” he teased. “Don’t worry girls, Strider’s enough prince charming to go around!”

“You were the fairy godmother before,” John pointed out, grabbing his suitcase and starting to drag it to the exit. He didn’t seem to have any problems moving it, even though Tavros was sure it had to be heavy enough to give even him or Terezi trouble.

Dave waved a hand in a gesture of dismissal. “Bro can be the fairy godmother. He looks way better in a tutu anyhow,” he said. A hand snaked out from behind and slapped him, but Dave seemed to have been expecting it because he ducked forwards just as the impact came. Tavros let himself fall behind and roll along next to Terezi, watching as Dave and John bantered back and forth as if they saw each other in person every day, the blond boy more animated than Tavros could remember him ever being before.

“I, er, thought that they'd never actually, met each other before?” he said, puzzled. Terezi shrugged.

“Who can fathom this human disease called friendship?” she replied, wearing the softest smile Tavros had ever seen on her face as they followed the humans to the vehicle.

Getting Tavros’ wheelchair in the same car trunk as John’s suitcase was a challenge he thankfully got to sit out of. A fair amount of cursing came from behind the car, most of it Dave, before everyone else started to climb in. John ended up sat next to Tavros and behind Dave, and no sooner had they started moving than the dark-haired boy was leaning forwards and craning to see out of the car.

“Your horns are in the way,” he complained. “Actually, it’s amazing they even fit in here at all!” He laughed, a bubbling sort of sound. “Can I touch them?”

Tavros flushed as Terezi let out a gasp. “Oh, Dave,” she said, a smile starting to creep onto her lips. “You didn’t tell me your John friend was so forward!”

“What?” John asked, confused. “What did I say?” He raised his hands to his mouth in shock. “Oh, no, did I just proposition you? I didn’t mean to!”

Tavros had to giggle. “No, it, uh, it isn’t like that,” he explained. “Horns are, um, for fighting?”

“But I don’t want to fight you either!” John yelped, waving his arms and forcing Dave to duck quickly under his flailing. Terezi leaned over and waved an admonishing finger at the human.

“You are a complete wiggler,” she told him. “But since I am feeling magnanimous today, I shall be your schoolfeeder. A troll's horns are sensitive at the base, and that makes them a vulnerability as much as a weapon. Letting someone touch them at all is a sign of great trust. You must never, ever touch a troll there!” She grinned slyly. “Unless they ask you to. But they won’t.” She settled back in her seat.

John nodded solemnly. “I’m sorry,” he said, sounding slightly disappointed, and Tavros suddenly felt a little guilty for letting him down.

“It, uh, should be okay to just touch the horns,” he said, feeling his stomach drop even as he said the words. “Just, not where, um, people might get the wrong idea?”

John didn’t wait for a second invitation. Long, slim fingers reached out and brushed the far end of Tavros’ horn. The troll kept his eyes on the fingers, unable to feel them against the hard shell, and after a breath-stopping minute or so they withdrew.

“Feels kind of rough,” John said thoughtfully, rubbing his fingertips together. Then he dropped his hands and the thoughtful frown on his face brightened. Earlier curiosity clearly sated, he looked to Dave. “So where are we going?”

Dave leaned his head back and smirked. “Put it this way, Egbert. We are in Los Angeles. What, other than the gray spacemen that you have already fondled....”

“Daaave!”

“... _and molested_ to your heart’s content, is the most interesting thing about this city?”

Egbert’s eyes grew wide. “Hollywood?” he squeaked. Dave gave a single affirmative jerk of his head.

“Get ready to have your mind blown, Egbert, because this is my city and you are getting the VIP tour.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> DAY TWO HAS BEGUN!!! Hopefully this chapter is an improvement on the last one. :S
> 
> Next update will probably be about a day late as I have places to be. I am gonna see the Avengers film Saturday if I gotta hold up the cinema at gunpoint, gogdamnit!
> 
> Also, a huge thanks to all the people who are reading this! My hit count BLOWS MY TINY LITTLE MIND every time I see it and that is all you guys. You rock forever.


	12. ==> Be The Excitable Bucktoothed Prankster

### CHAPTER ELEVEN ==> Be The Excitable Bucktoothed Prankster

John Egbert was, without a doubt, having the best day of his life. So what if he was only fifteen? There was nothing that could happen in the next six decades or so that would come even remotely close to being this cool and amazing. He was actually meeting Dave, and Dave's awesome troll friends, and best of all they were on a Tour Bus being driven around Hollywood!

Okay, so it wasn't quite perfect. They couldn't sit on the open top deck of the bus because of Tavros' wheelchair, and the houses and studios were actually all starting to blur together a bit, and even without a time difference John was starting to think that he might have some jet lag after all... but none of that mattered because he was actually there and this was actually happening, right now. The four of them sprawled across the seats at the front of the bus, leaning over forwards and kneeling up to face back, passing round a bag of cheesy puffs and discussing non-stop the various films they each held dear.

“... and then he holds it out, the bunny, and it's been getting all messed up the whole time...”

“Fuck's sake, John,” Dave said, snagging the snacks out of his wildly gesticulating hands before tragedy struck. “Nobody gives a shit about Con Air. Nic Cage being a sweaty asshole in a wifebeater? I can get that down on any street corner; they're pretty much just giving it away, hoping somebody out there still has a hard-on for heroic renegades with nothing left to lose. Including acting talent.”

Terezi cackled, and it really was a cackle, harsh and wicked. John thought that it was one of the coolest things about her. Apart from her being a troll and seeing with her tongue, of course.

“I am interested in the tale of the repentant wrongdoer and his problematic return home,” she said, leaning to rest on the seat back. “Dave, I insist that we procure this 'Con Air' and watch it together.”

“Oh, cool!” John said as Dave pretended to groan. “We can have a movie night!” He turned excitedly to the fourth member of their party. “What about you, Tavros? Do you want in on a brilliant movie bonanza?”

Tavros grinned awkwardly. For an alien with teeth and claws and enormous horns, John thought that he actually seemed pretty shy. It was a lot easier to forget that he wasn't human than it was with Terezi, which didn't really matter because John kind of liked the guy. For all that Terezi was utterly cool and Dave had been his best friend forever, Tavros sure was easier to get along with!

“I, uh, think that would be fun?” the alien boy ventured. “I could, er, ask Dad if we can, do it at our house.”

“That is a very good plan,” Terezi agreed. “John can bring his Con Air, and I will provide Suspect Zero.”

John grinned. “I have no idea what that is,” he admitted.

“It is a film in which an FBI agent hunts a serial killer, and to tell you any more would ruin it,” Terezi told him smugly.

“Okay, fair enough!” John agreed. “How about you, Dave?”

His friend shrugged. “Man, I dunno. Hardcore smuppet porn?”

“Daaave!”

“Okay, fine.” John could have sworn that Dave was smiling a little. “I'll bring Troll Two. It's the most epic pile of shit ever filmed and gets extra bonus points for having a retroactive racial slur as the title. Seriously, man, you've gotta see it to believe how epic this shit is. We can MST the fuck outta it. It'll be hilarious.”

John laughed. “Oh, man.” He looked over at Tavros. “How about you? What do you want to watch?”

“Um,” Tavros flushed, his cheeks turning the same coppery color that was just starting to show in his irises. Dave had once told John that trolls all had different colored blood and that everything from their spit to their eyes was the same shade, but it was still pretty odd to see for real. “I was, er, thinking we could watch Peter Pan? If that's okay,” he added hastily.

“Man, that would be so ironic if you weren't for real,” Dave said with a sigh. “John, you gotta have full disclosure here. Tav has like a Peter Pan fetish or some shit. Like he wants to be him, and he probably jerks off to getting captured by Captain Hook too.”

Tavros definitely flushed a darker copper. “That, um, that's not...”

Dave leaned back in his seat and started thrusting two fingers of one hand through a loose fist of the other. “Ungh, ungh, oh, Captain Hook,” he moaned. “Is that a peg-leg in your pocket or are you just pleased to see me...”

“Eww, Dave!” John exclaimed, reaching out to grab his friend's wrist even as he started breaking down into giggles. “That's really gross!”

The corner of Dave's mouth twitched up. “Oh, Captain,” he purred, leaning forward. “Don't stop, please, I want your man-sausage between my tender boyish asscheeks!”

Terezi was howling too, but in the midst of his giggles John could see that Tavros was burying his face in his hands. “Dave,” he gasped, trying to stop the laughter. “Dave, please stop, I think you're upsetting him!”

Dave glanced over at Tavros. “That true, man?”

Tavros peeked up from his hands, face so brown that his skin barely even seemed gray any more. “I, uh, I'm okay, really,” he muttered. Terezi, still grinning, reached over to shove him gently in the shoulder.

“We're not laughing at you,” she told him. “It's just the idea. We can watch your human Pupa Pan story again if you like.”

“Yeah, man,” Dave agreed. “Didn't mean to upset you or anything, just gotta laugh at the thought of Hook and Pan going at it. It's such a fuckin' terrible porn idea. I gotta look for it when I get home.”

Tavros groaned. “Um, you're not going to, send me a, er, link again, are you?” he asked. Dave held his hands up, all innocence.

“No way, man. I know Never-Never-Land is sacred ground for you, I ain't gonna profane it any more.” He settled back in his seat. “Bring it to the movie night, I'll even sing along to the cheesy-ass songs.”

“Uh, okay,” Tavros agreed, a relieved smile appearing on his face. “I'll, um, ask my Dad about maybe, tomorrow night?”

“Sounds good,” Dave said. “'Rezi?”

Terezi nodded and John clapped his hands in delight. “Great!” he exclaimed. “This is going to be the best movie night ever!”

“Hey, is that Ben Stiller?” Dave asked, and suddenly all attention was back out of the windows.

The tour ride eventually ended back at the same stop where Bro had dropped them all off a couple of hours previously, vanishing off to deposit John's luggage at the apartment and return their borrowed vehicle to its rightful owner. The four of them stood on the sidewalk and contemplated their next action. Deciding that the clear and present need currently was for excessive quantities of junk food, they set out in search of a fast food place and were soon rewarded with a burger franchise.

“This is pretty much the final touch for a day of ironic tourism,” Dave observed. “Let's do it.”

John followed his friends in, glad that at least there was fairly little chance of cake in the near future. There was a minor issue getting Tavros' horns through the double swing doors, resolved when John held one and Dave the other, and then they were examining the menu options thoughtfully.

“Uh, there does not, appear to be, um, any troll food,” Tavros said. Terezi pulled a face.

“What is it?” John asked, looking at her in surprise. “I thought- I mean, don't you just eat the same food as humans?”

“Um, sort of?” Tavros said, looking thoughtfully at the menu. “But, some stuff, we kind of, er, need different amounts, really, and we can't, uh, eat, cooked meat.”

“Ew, gross!”

“Nobody's asking you to join us, blueberry boy,” Terezi pointed out. She put a hand on the back of Tavros' wheelchair and stared at nothing. “We'll just have some desserts. No need to freak out.”

John grinned because she was right and decided that he would rather have a cheeseburger. They went to the counter and he noticed that the girl who took their order seemed kind of flustered. In fact, when he looked around the whole place seemed to be trying not to stare at them. They'd got a few looks on the tour bus, but he'd assumed that was because they were acting sort of unruly. Now he was starting to wonder, because of all the faces he could see, none of them were gray. Actually, now he thought about it, Terezi and Tavros had been the only trolls on the bus too. Which was weird, because according to Dave there were loads of trolls round where he lived. Maybe they just didn't do the tourist thing?

There was a sudden yelp from Tavros and a curse in a human voice. John looked around to see a teenager a few years older than them rubbing his arm and glaring at Tavros, who had grabbed each of his horns and was looking sheepishly at the injured human and his two friends.

“Watch where you're going, troll,” one of the two friends sneered. John saw Dave and Terezi tense, but Tavros just seemed to shrink back in his wheelchair.

“I, uh, sorry,” he stammered. The one rubbing his arm glowered and raised the offending appendage; the fabric of his neat brown jacket was clearly torn.

“Fuck, look at this!” he said. “You owe me a hundred dollars, you fucking goat-eater.”

Two sudden blurs, one red and one teal, stepped in front of the nervous troll. Dave put his hands on his hips and glared while Terezi waved an admonishing finger at the bullies.

“Why don't you all just run off home and leave him alone?” she asked. The teen with the torn jacket laughed, but his eyes narrowed sharply.

“Holy fuck, it's another one,” he said. “You his girlfriend, his sister, or both?”

“You shut the fuck up right now,” Dave said. He was quiet, but John had never heard him be so menacing- or so clearly sincere. He swallowed and backed up, unable to look away from the tense showdown.

“Reckon that's the boyfriend,” said the teen who had been first to speak.

“Yeah, but with which one?” the third one asked, snickering.

The one with the torn jacket looked at John's friends with a sneer. “Hell, could be both. Little gray fuckers are like that, aren't they?”

Dave's fists clenched, and Terezi's grip on her cane shifted slightly. John looked around the room- whether for a weapon or a place to hide, he wasn't sure. He found faces turned towards them, everyone in the place watching the drama unfold. A harried looking man in a yellow shirt was hurrying towards them.

“Hey!” he yelled. The two groups turned to focus on him, and zeroed in on the small tag on his chest that proclaimed him to be the manager. He stabbed an angry finger towards Terezi. “Get out.”

“But they didn't start it!” John protested, then immediately clapped his hand over his mouth when everyone started staring at him instead. The manager scowled.

“Look, you can have your money back, but I'm afraid you'll have to leave. We don't tolerate violent behavior here.”

“The fuck?” Dave said, voice dangerously chill. “We hardly even fuckin' said anything- it's all these assholes. Are you retarded?”

The manager folded his arms and raised his chin in a gesture of wobbly protest. “Leave or I'm calling the police,” he ordered.

Dave stared impassively at the man while Terezi retrieved their money from behind the counter, then the two of them took up flanking positions either side of Tavros' wheelchair. As they started to move slowly out of the now-silent burger place, John started trailing after them, casting enough nervy glances back at the three jerks that he almost walked into the door on the way out. As they crossed the asphalt back to the street, Dave kicked violently at a passing crumpled paper wrap.

“I should go back in there and kick their asses into next week,” he said grimly. “No, fuck that. Next year. Next decade. I will kick them so far into the future that their tiny Neanderthal brains can't figure out how to work the TV remote and they are stuck watching the nine hundredth shitty installment of Rocky for the rest of their lives.”

“I don't understand,” John said, still confused. “Why did the manager kick us out when the others started it?”

Terezi shrugged. “I believe the human word is _racism_ ,” she told him, surprisingly gentle. “Sometimes it happens. It is not worth getting upset over idiots.” The last part seemed to be directed more towards Dave, who let his tense shoulders slump as Terezi's hand ghosted over them.

John's eyes widened. “But aren't you mad?”

“Um, sort of?” Tavros explained. “I, er, mean, it sucks, and I feel kind of bad now, and, uh, it's scary too.” He gave John a sheepish grin. “But it, uh, beats the hemospectrum, and culling drones,” he added.

“They will learn in the end,” Terezi agreed. “Even if I have to teach them one day.”

The incident still put a damper on the afternoon, and at John's suggestion they agreed to call it a day and meet up again tomorrow. Terezi called her human Mom to collect her and Tavros, and waved off any suggestion that the two human boys wait with them.

“John is tired and needs his rest,” she argued. “We will be fine without you. Go and catch your bus home.”

Dave gave Terezi a simple fist bump before exchanging a complex handshake with Tavros, then he and John set out for a bus stop. The journey across the city was uneventful, although the crowded commuter transport was far busier than John was used to. They stood up for most of the journey, Dave free-standing while John clutched at every available handhold, and got off at a battered bus stop defaced with black graffiti.

“This way,” Dave said, making a beeline straight for a Chinese Takeaway across the road. John followed him in and let his more confident friend order for him, not knowing what to make of most of the strange things listed on the menu. Dave bought far more than John thought they could eat, but when he questioned it he was reminded that Bro needed food too. John promptly proceeded to feel kind of daft for not realizing that.

Food bought and dinner organized, Dave and John split the cartons between them and resumed the walk back to Dave's place. The two boys meandered down the sidewalk, hands full with the neat little boxes of Chinese bounty. Dave seemed keen to just keep moving, but John was watching everything around him with wide eyes, from the cars that crawled along the road to the jagged skyline of the mismatched buildings jutting into each others' space. He stared at the people around them in all their gray-skinned or tattooed glory, and he cast curious glances at the eclectic stock of the small shops that lined the streets, some of the signs written in runic Alternian script.

“Wow, it really is like alchemy symbols!” he observed, staring at a splash of bright graffiti on a brown wall. Dave groaned.

“Egbert, I know that there is basically no way to stop you from acting like a five-year-old in Disneyland, but can you at least try to act chill before Mickey Mouse and all his magical buddies take offense to your gawking and kick our asses the fuck out of the park?”

John flushed. Of course it was rude to stare. “Oh, man, sorry Dave!” he said. He was going to continue, but then he caught sight of something that made him stop dead. “Oh wow, is that them?”

“What?” Dave asked, the faintest hint of impatience coloring his voice as he stopped to wait. John awkwardly shifted his grip on the takeaway and pointed with one finger.

“Orphan Annie and Tiny Tim?”

Dave followed his gesture to where two trolls about their own age were sat against a building. The taller one with the long horns was half lying down with lidded eyes, leaning against the shorter, nubby-horned one who was alternately smiling at passers-by, then glowering and flipping them off as they walked past unheeding. John wasn't really an expert in reading people, but the troll's smiles looked fairly forced. The glaring, however, was both genuine and funny enough to make John giggle. Dave turned back to give him a weird look, inscrutable behind the aviators.

“Yeah, that's them,” he said. “But I'm not interested in... hey, what the fuck?” Because John had just walked right past his friend and was striding purposefully up to the two trolls. The one with nubby horns was looking at him uncertainly as he approached, and John decided that the best way to break the ice was to offer up his carton of Sweet and Sour Veg in an out-thrust hand and smile brightly. The troll stared. This close, John could see a tint of red in his gray irises.

“What,” he said slowly, in a voice that sounded a bit like he gargled rocks daily, “the actual fuck.” There was a patter of footsteps from behind John, and as the troll's eyes flicked to Dave they lit with recognition before falling into exasperation. “Oh, fucking hell. It's you.”

“Nice to see you too, sweetheart,” Dave sneered. John blinked in surprise at the hostility pouring off his friend. It seemed so out of place with what Dave had told him, and pretty unwarranted to boot, so like any reasonable buddy would he decided to try and smooth the situation over.

“Hi, my name's John,” he told the trolls. The taller one was opening his eyes and rolling his head to watch lazily, now, so John gave him a cheery smile too. “I'm Dave's friend from out of town!”

“What the everloving fuck is this?” the smaller troll snapped, ignoring John to look right at Dave. “What are we, a fucking tourist attraction now? I thought I had a handle on all the ways you were a complete bulgemunching nookstain but no, you have to drag your dumbfuck retarded friends over here to mock us too.”

Dave snorted derisively, and John was amazed at how expressive his friend was being, faced with the incomprehensible anger of the troll. “Dude, this was not my idea,” he said. “And for the record, I don't care what shit you say about me, but my buddy here is a stand-up guy in the most unironic possible way, and if you insult him again I will kick your scrawny gray ass. Also unironically.”

John froze, looking between them as they glared daggers at each other, and was surprised to feel the brush of long fingers against his own. He looked down to see the taller troll reaching to take the takeaway carton out of his hand. One slightly indigo eye closed in a slow wink as the troll smiled toothily, and John smiled back even though something about the troll made him feel slightly nervous.

“So, um, what's your name?” he asked brightly, trying to ignore the unaccountable sense of misgiving in his stomach. The tall troll settled back against his friend and continued to stare at John for a few seconds too long before answering.

“I'm all called Gamzee, man,” he said, his voice an odd singsong drawl. “And this grouchy motherfucker up in here is my best motherfucking friend Karkat.”

“Jegus fuck, Gamzee!” the other troll exploded. “Don't just tell our names to every random asshole who asks!”

“But I told you my name,” John pointed out.

“Our names,” Dave corrected, and he actually sounded slightly put out about that. John made a mental note to apologize later, but he really had though that the trolls would already know! Well, he would have if he had thought about it. Telling people your name was just what you did when you met them, right?

“Just because you have the reasoning capacity of a week-old grub doesn't mean I want my fucking moirail inviting every passing weirdo to stick their cartilage nub into our lives,” Karkat growled. “Gamzee, you are a fucking idiot. I mean it. What the fuck were you even... wait, what is that?”

Gamzee held out the now open carton of sauce-drenched vegetables. “Dunno,” he said cheerfully. “Some motherfucking miracle food or some shit.”

“It's probably poisoned,” Karkat grumbled, but he stuck a single black claw daintily into the box and tasted a small fragment of the contents. “Fuck, this is almost palatable,” he said, digging his fingers back in for more. John giggled and earned himself a glare. “Something funny, asshole?”

John fought back against a smile, knowing that the grouchy troll probably wouldn't appreciate hearing how downright adorable the pair of them had just looked. “You're not supposed to eat it with your fingers,” he managed.

Karkat glared. “Right, I'll just start using one of the many fucking fancy eating utensils that we keep in our fully stocked food preparation block,” he snarled, waving his free hand expressively at the surrounding street. “Or better yet, I'll crawl off and cull myself out of shame for getting your stupid fucking human etiquette wrong. Obviously eating with our claws is a disgraceful act on a par with losing a fight with a parblind purrbeast kitten and we should be mortified by our own inadequacy!”

“Hey, lay off him,” Dave snapped- actually snapped- from just behind John. “He's trying to help your ungrateful ass. Do you think you could stop being a complete fuckwad for maybe five minutes, or is it fuckin' hard-wired into your genes?”

“Oh, I'm sorry,” Karkat sneered. “I didn't know I was supposed to fawn over you like a barkbeast when you chuck me a few scraps. How's this for gratitude; thank you so much for showing up and making my already fucking awful day even worse, you insufferable prick. I hope your overinflated thinkpan continues to swell until it explodes, at which point the fecal matter that fills it will probably contrive to rain down on me anyway because as far as I can tell your life exists solely for the purpose of ruining mine.”

“Woah!” John exclaimed, jumping between the pair and holding out pacifying hands to try and cool some of the crackling tension. “Look, Dave, it's okay, really! I kind of like his insults, they're pretty funny! And Karkat, I'm sorry if I upset you, but I really was just trying to help and I know we only just met but you seem pretty cool and I don't want you to hate me or something!”

There was a long pause, and then Karkat smacked both of his palms into his face, hard. “Fuuuck,” he moaned. “Fucking humans! I don't fucking hate you, you nookwhiff, because if I did I'd either be trying to kill you or I'd be trying to get you into a kismessitude with me! Not that I want you in a fucking quadrant, caliginous or ashen, because I am not fucking desperate or twisted enough to go for a pasty brown alien- but whatever, I haven't known you long enough to hate you properly, although I probably could in time because you are fucking annoying, okay! Now you have delivered your fucking food, your asshole friend has threatened me a couple times, and I have had ample time to look like a complete fucking idiot, so how about you just turn around and go about your happy little grubfucking life and leave us the hell alone!”

As Gamzee shifted to pull a stiff, resisting Karkat into a one-armed hug and make gentle shooshing noises, John shifted awkwardly from foot to foot. “It just doesn't feel right to leave you,” he said awkwardly. “I mean, we've been having this whole conversation. I can't just walk away!”

“Sure you can,” Karkat said, the bite vanishing from his voice as the other troll gently rubbed a hand along his shoulder. “Just turn around and put one foot in front of the other repeatedly. You were doing it earlier, and not even you are fucking stupid enough to have forgotten that.”

John shook his head. “But what about you?” he asked, feeling oddly lost. The short troll sighed heavily.

“Oh, for fuck's sake. Are you defective or something?” Karkat didn't wait for a response. “Since you clearly are, just take it from me, because I know how this human pity shit works. You will turn around and walk away and in about five minutes you won't give a flying fuck about us any more because you have already done your good fucking deed for the day. Go, feel like a decent human being. You sure as fuck qualify, so stop wasting your fucking time already.”

He sounded sad, John realized. Behind the bitterness and the anger, Karkat sounded tired and sad, and before he even knew what he was going to say the human boy was opening his mouth.

“Come with us,” he said. Two shocked trolls and one deadpan Strider stared at him.

“What. The. Fuck,” Dave said. John's brain caught up with his mouth and he flushed bright red as he realized that he had just invited two practical strangers into Dave's home. He hadn't even been there himself yet! Then again, he still kind of wanted them to come along, and he had already issued the invitation. It wasn't as if he could take it back now, not without being even more ungentlemanly.

“Come on, Dave,” he pleaded, determined to argue his case. “It doesn't have to be for long or anything, I just think it would be so cool if they stayed overnight. Like a sleepover!” He presented his most ingratiating smile to Dave. “You did say I could do whatever I wanted in LA.”

“Yeah, within reason,” Dave pointed out. “I didn't mean you could invite random troll assholes to come sleep in my apartment! Or to rip off all our stuff then go all Nightmare on Elm Street while we're sleeping. Cops would pretty much write that off as suicide. Are you fuckin' nuts?”

“Hey, don't we get a say in this?” Karkat interrupted. “Because hilarious as watching you two bicker all evening might be, I just want to make it clear that there is not a fucking chance in hell that we are gonna follow you anywhere anyway!”

“Wait, why the motherfuck not?” Gamzee pulled round to look at Karkat, who smacked a palm into his own face again.

“How much of a complete dumbfuck rotpan are you?” the shorter troll demanded. “Seriously? Rule fucking one, Gamzee; never follow anyone, anywhere, especially if they're trying to bribe you with food and promises! That's how kids like us fucking _vanish!"_

“Whoa, hold up,” Dave said, raising a hand in the universal gesture for stop. “Are you seriously suggesting that me and Egbert are gonna drag you off and kidnap you and sell your little gray butts to some creepy ass child-catcher?”

Karkat sneered. “No, fucktard, because you are a pair of squishy brown humans and you couldn't beat us in a straight-up fight if your lives depended on it.”

“Then what are you so chickenshit about?” Dave asked, folding his arms into a picture of complete nonchalance. Karkat glowered.

“First, because you could lead us into a fucking ambush with a half dozen guys and then we would be completely fucked. Second, I am not 'chickenshit', you are. You seriously think we're going to rip you off and stab you up and get the cops all over our asses? If we were that fucking stupid we wouldn't be sitting out here having this inane excuse for a conversation, we'd be lurking in some dark fucking alleyway beating the shit out of assholes. Rich assholes.”

“Sounds pretty chickenshit to me,” Dave said, shrugging. “I ain't seeing it, dude.”

“Fine!” Karkat spat. “You want me to prove I'm not a cluckbeast? I'll come to your shitty apartment and I'll sleep there, too! Unless you're too much of a scared little wiggler to let us in, that is.”

“Fine,” Dave said. “But if you touch any of my stuff you are dead meat.”

“Like I would want to touch your stupid fucking human shit,” Karkat replied, getting to his feet in a series of short, fierce motions. John backed off hurriedly as he advanced on Dave. “You try anything, I swear I will fucking dismember you.”

“Whatever, dude,” Dave said. “You are so fuckin' chicken.” He turned and continued down the road, ignoring Karkat who stomped along behind him. John stared at their retreating backs.

“Hey, man, can you give a brother a hand?”

John looked round to see Gamzee gathering up the scruffy blanket and cardboard sheets from the ground where he had been sitting on them. The troll waved a hand at the coffee cup Karkat had left behind.

“Gotta bring this shit all along,” he explained. “Or it's gonna up and motherfucking vanish on us.”

John nodded in red-faced acknowledgment and grabbed the cup, which jingled with coins. Gamzee finished arranging his burden and smiled brightly.

“Which way we all up and going'?” he asked, and realizing that he had no idea John hastily scanned the street for his friend. He caught sight of him turning the corner up ahead.

“Come on!” he yelled, and the pair of them raced together after the distant figures of Karkat and Dave.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, I did say it would be late, but I wasn't expecting to be quite this late!
> 
> Welcome to the halfway mark, and more than 1000 hits! Hooray for all!


	13. ==> Be The Stylish Gothic Mediator

### CHAPTER TWELVE ==> Be The Stylish Gothic Mediator

Kanaya Maryam often despaired of her friends' ability to clothe themselves, but never more so than when they attempted to dress impressively.

“No, Eridan, you cannot wear those pants with that shirt,” she insisted. The seadweller scowled and tried to snatch the bright blue pantaloons out of her hands; Kanaya quickly pulled the garment back out of his reach and returned his frown with one of her own.

“I am in fact unconvinced that you can wear these pants at all,” she added, taking in the skinny teenager clad in a purple silk shirt and- oh dear, were those goldfish pattern boxers? He saw her staring at his bare legs and leered.

“You know, if you like what you see...”

“Finish that sentence and I will _feed_ you these abominable things,” she interrupted icily. Eridan's mouth snapped shut and she jabbed a stern finger at the pair of black suit trousers laid out on the camp-bed. “You will wear those, and you will take off at least half of your jewelery.”

Eridan winced. “But Kan,” he whined. “This is all signs a my fuckin' nobility!”

“On Alternia, perhaps,” she replied, lips pursed. “Here on Earth it is simply crass. Unless you wish to be 'blinged out' like a gangsta rap star.” As Eridan visibly drooped, she glanced at the clock on the mantle. “Now you have twenty minutes to finish your preparations. I suggest you do not give me cause to take further issue with your sartorial choices.”

Ignoring Eridan's furious babble, she headed up the stairs and ducked into the room she shared with Feferi. She found the Heiress sitting on the bed wrestling angrily with a hairbrush; although she was wearing the delicate shimmering purple gown that Kanaya had selected for the occasion, she had not even made a start on her makeup. The jade-blooded troll sighed deeply and gently plucked the offending hairbrush from her friend's hand.

“Allow me,” she said, waiting for a nod of permission before settling in to gently tease out the knots and snarls in Feferi's hair. From this position, just behind and above her and with the other troll's head bowed forwards, it would be easy to break her neck. Kanaya focused on making her motions soft and swift, knowing that no reassurance would convince Feferi's instincts that she was in no danger. Fortunately it didn't take long to tidy the long black mass, and Kanaya slipped the seadweller's tiara back on to hold her hair in place. Perfect.

“There,” she smiled. “Would you like some help with the rest?”

Feferi shook her head, beaming happily nonetheless. “No, I can manage,” she said. “But thank you for your kelp!”

Kanaya returned the smile. “I'll go and check on the humans,” she said. “Do make sure that Sollux is ready, won't you?”

Feferi laughed, a small bubbling giggle. “I already did,” she told Kanaya. “That's why I'm running so late myself!”

Kanaya could imagine. She had long since given up trying to personally make sure Sollux was suitably attired for these events and now left it entirely to Feferi, her own role strictly advisory. Honestly, it was impossible to dress someone elegantly when they insisted on wearing odd shoes, shirts that were half red and half blue, and bee-striped polyester jackets. Doubly so when they viewed the entire endeavor as a waste of valuable computer time. He was worse than Eridan and Jade combined.

Speaking of Jade... when Kanaya entered the room next door, she found Rose crouching to apply eyeshadow to her still and patient friend, who looked far older than usual in a long, velvet black dress. Kanaya wandered over to see what colors Rose was using, and was surprised to see a hint of green over Jade's eye. A human with darker coloring could pull off stronger colors, of course, and it did bring out her irises- but Kanaya thought she would have softened it a little more. Not that it looked bad, not at all.

“I hope you don't mind that I borrowed your makeup,” Rose said, adding the finishing touches to the other human girl's eyeshadow. “I'm afraid I lacked the appropriate shade.”

“No, that's quite alright,” Kanaya told her. “I would happily have donated it. Jade, you look wonderful.”

Jade opened her eyes and beamed. “Really?” she squeaked. A flicker of mischief crossed her face. “Oh, I've got to go show Eridan,” she said, the smile becoming an evil grin. “He said I couldn't look like anything other than an untamed meowbeast if my life depended on it.”

“Well then, I suggest you go and prove him wrong,” Rose told her. Jade jumped up and darted out of the room, dress swirling around her and not concealing that there were no shoes on her stockinged feet. Kanaya hummed thoughtfully.

“A problem?” Rose asked. Kanaya smiled.

“Just wondering if Eridan put his pants on yet.”

The pair of them listened a second longer until the yelling began, then Rose quietly walked over and closed the door with a soft click. Kanaya admired her short black dress and its purple underskirts, and even more so the effortless grace with which the human wore them. Her face was painted subtly, shades of gold around the eyes and a slightly richer than natural red on the lips; Kanaya often wondered what those lips would feel like, with skin so thin as to show clearly the blood beneath. Soft, she thought, even more so than the rest of Rose's skin, but she had never yet dared to find out.

Rose gave her an appraising look. “White and green,” she observed. “You'll have to be careful not to spill anything on that.”

“I was attempting to choose colors that would suggest harmlessness to humans in this culture,” Kanaya replied primly. “It is why the accents for Feferi's dress are also white.” It was odd how the humans in this region associated black with death and white with innocence, but she supposed it made sense to them. With their daylight society and love of bright things humans often reminded her of rainbow drinkers anyway.

“And of course, green brings out your eyes,” Rose said, drifting a little closer. A little too close, perhaps- Kanaya could feel her pulse racing as the other girl advanced into her personal space. Sometimes, although she had never told the human girl this, she liked to use the human oddities of behavior to pretend that Rose was a rainbow drinker. That one day the hunger would get too much, and sharp fangs would pierce her gray skin in an immortal kiss...

“Green lips too, I see,” Rose commented, only a few scant inches from Kanaya's face. She smiled. “A success, I think.”

“That remains to be seen,” Kanaya pointed out, wondering if Rose knew the effect she was having. From Kanaya's perspective her reactions felt unmissable- but then, Rose was just as close to her, and all she could sense from the human girl was a faint scent of perfume. Kanaya was by no means an expert in human scents after only two years on the planet, but this one she recognized. Roses.

So many layers of delicate implication in this dance, but Kanaya was growing impatient. “Is there a reason you have decided to seal us in this room?” she asked pleasantly, smiling and tilting her head even nearer.

Rose raised a single eyebrow. “Just the two of us, alone?” she asked, and there was definitely amusement in her voice. Kanaya could feel her cheeks flushing and suddenly she was too afraid of the answer to ask the question.

“A terrible waste of time, no?” she said, stepping back from Rose as she did so. Already feeling ashamed of her emotional cowardice, she extended a hand, ostensibly as a friendly gesture but in truth an apology. “Shall we, Miss Lalonde?”

Rose chuckled softly, not visibly put out at all. “Why yes, I think we shall, Miss Maryam,” she agreed, slipping her arm into the crook of Kanaya's. The pair of them walked arm-in-arm downstairs where they found the living room in uproar, Sollux and Eridan busily insulting each other's fashion sense or lack thereof while Jade egged them on and Feferi attempted to calm them both down. She was still, Kanaya noted in exasperation, not wearing her makeup.

“That's quite emu... ennu... enough!” declared a firm voice from above as Doctor Lalonde descended the stairs, Mr Harley at her side. She seemed to be weaving a bit and as usual had a glass in her hand, but her voice was steady and silence fell before her watchful glare. After a moment her severe expression was split by a brilliant smile.

“That's better,” she said, and hiccuped. So quietly that only Kanaya could have heard it, Rose groaned. The troll girl reached out to squeeze her adoptive sister's hand, thoughts of more concupiscent relationships forgotten for the meanwhile.

“Now then, young ladies and gents,” Mr Harley said, rubbing his hands together in anticipation. “Shall we get this show on the road like civilized beings?”

There was a chorus of slightly embarrassed assent, which the old human took as his cue to escort the tipsy Doctor out to the waiting limousine. The driver- a different man from the previous night's chauffeur- held the door open for them as they got in. Kanaya thanked him and deliberately maneuvered to sit next to Rose and almost dead opposite Feferi, who was flanked by an affronted Eridan and sullen Sollux. Jade was the last to climb in, having paused to say a tearful goodbye to Bec.

“For cod's sake,” Eridan muttered as they pulled away, Jade still glued to the retreating view of her beloved dog. “You're goin' ta see the fuckin' thing again real soon, it's not like you're goin' away forewer or somethin'!”

Jade responded by punching him in the arm. Sollux sniggered.

Kanaya chose to ignore the childish antics of her peers and instead produced a makeup kit from her neat white handbag, a twin for Feferi's own. “Here,” she said, pulling out a rich Tyrian purple lipstick that she had stowed there hours earlier, knowing from experience that this was bound to happen. “Purse your lips.”

Feferi obeyed and Kanaya proceeded to add a little color to the Heiress' face. The shades that accented her purplish blood weren't too dissimilar from some that would suit a human, which would hopefully make her seem a little more human herself. Kanaya knew that her own bright jade blood, exact compliment to carmine red, would forever mark her as alien on this world. Despite her facial fins and gills, Feferi had a much better chance of seeming, for lack of a better word, normal- and for tonight that was important.

By the time the limo pulled up at the venue they were all presentable, or as close as they would ever get. Lights flashed as the society pages fought to get their perfect shot, and it was too late to worry about what anyone was wearing. Taking a deep breath and receiving a reassuring hand-squeeze from Mr Harley, Feferi opened the door and stepped out.

Kanaya ended up being somewhere in the middle of the group, more than a little dazed by the lights and attention. For all that she was and had been a leader of her people, she was not used to the publicity that Feferi went out of her way to attract. She dared a glance over at Rose, and thought that behind the human girl's perfect poise she might have caught a glimpse of the same dazzled confusion.

Sollux fared worst, of course. Even Feferi's patient influence couldn't stop him from glaring at the cameras, and Kanaya saw that he had once again chosen to wear one red shoe and one blue one. And they were his usual ragged baseball shoes. Wonderful. Eridan had too much jewelery _still_ , enough to blind someone with the reflected glare, and Doctor Lalonde was definitely already sozzled. The jade-blood resisted the urge to pinch the bridge of her nose in frustration. It was, she supposed, as much as could have been expected. They stepped inside, away from the constant roar of the press, and Kanaya marveled at the wood-paneled entrance hall, running a finger along a smooth carving of a flower as they handed their coats to the troll whose burnt orange symbol was stitched neatly on the shoulder of his tuxedo. Human architecture at its best never failed to impress her. There was something to be said for generations of technical and artistic expertise even if it lost the raw creativity possessed by an Alternian Hive, designed by a young troll and built by drones to their instruction.

Then they passed into the main ballroom, and Kanaya's breath was taken away by the glittering rainbow of colors, warm yellow light sparkling against the bright dresses of the women and the drab evening wear of the men. In one corner a large TV screen showed cycling images of Alternians, from the initial shaky footage of the ship crashing and the closed-circuit images from Quarantine to clips of young Alternians in school alongside humans and playing happily in public spaces.

 _Look at us, just like you,_ Kanaya thought, amused. They had thought long and hard about what images to show people and after a prolonged debate had decided to display the dream of integration first hand. Not all of the footage had been so heartening, and Rose had suggested that some of it could be put to use reminding people why they needed financial support in the first place. She had been shot down immediately by Eridan, and obnoxious as he had been Kanaya had agreed with the core of his point. As Feferi had put it, they wanted people to help them because they shared a hope for the future, not because they were begging for charity.

Not that anyone here seemed to consider that to be the nature of the event; all eyes turned as they entered the room and there was a round of applause, their group quickly swamped with people who were eager for their company. Kanaya soon found herself locked in conversation with an elderly man who seemed determined to extol the virtues of a piece of legislation dedicated to creating jobs, expanding thriving communities, and improving cross-state travel times. Or possibly it was destroying a swathe of national parkland; Kanaya stopped listening except to nod politely when it became clear that the man was only interested in gathering any and all political support for his ambitions.

 _I suppose that even if we cannot vote, two hundred and fifty thousand voices speak loudly,_ she reasoned. She supposed she should be grateful he was choosing to ally himself with them instead of focusing on Alternians as an easy target, as some of his peers had done. No matter how annoying, the politician's clumsy attempt to solicit her support left her feeling more at ease. This room was full of people out for themselves and their own profit, whether financial, social or political. That was a situation she could understand and exploit.

Out of the corner of one eye she saw Jade waxing lyrical beside the buffet table at a middle-aged woman who seemed mildly horrified. Excusing herself from the tortuous conversation, Kanaya slipped across the floor to interrupt her human friend, by gently capturing her gesticulating hand and relieving her of the cream-stuffed canape she had been gesturing with. Fortunately humans didn't react nearly as badly to physical contact- or deliberate attempts to divest them of food- as most Alternians, and Jade responded by beaming at her rather than trying to claw holes in her face.

“Hi, Kanaya!” she said. “I was just talking to Ms Wayland here about our trip to Africa!”

Kanaya winced. She had heard all about the trip, of course, first from Feferi and later from Jade and Eridan, but although there were a great many interesting and worthwhile points to be made she doubted that the stories Jade was interested in telling were the ones best repeated in this company. In particular she recalled a moderately humorous yarn involving Eridan, a baby elephant and a bucket of water that could, to those who understood a little Alternian history and culture, be considered outright obscene.

“It's a pleasure to meet you, Ms Wayland,” she said, holding a beautifully gloved hand out to the woman. After a moment it was taken, and Kanaya could almost sense the woman's surprise that her claws didn't somehow draw blood even through the cloth. And really, this was an example of the people who were supposed to be on their side? Either Eridan was growing more and more reasonable, or this world was simply more ridiculous than she had ever given it credit for.

“Miss Mareeam,” the woman said, mangling Kanaya's last name in a way that suggested she had only ever seen it written down. “It's a pleasure to meet such a distinguished young woman.” Her eyes briefly flickered to Jade, who was taking advantage of the opportunity to stuff three tiny morsels of food into her mouth at once; surprisingly sensible for a human, but hardly appropriate to the venue. Kanaya wasn't sure which one of them she wanted to smack more, but she settled for wearing her most fake smile and thinking about how red really was not Mrs Wayland's color. It made her look like a tomato.

“Well, allow me to welcome you to the ball,” Kanaya told her, her most practiced sincerity foremost. “I hope you have an entertaining evening.”

The woman chuckled. “You hope I make a donation to your cause, you mean,” she said, eyes a-twinkle. Kanaya joined her laughter and felt the trap. _Why should I give you anything?_ the woman was asking. Well, the Mediator was not to be thrown that easily.

“Are you aware of my work with Doctor Lalonde?” Kanaya asked, pointing delicately with one surreptitious finger to where the woman in question was holding court by the bar. Fortunately for all concerned, she seemed to be keeping her drunkenness in check, becoming the life of the party rather than the talk of it. The woman followed her gaze and nodded absently.

“Yes... Alternian medicine, isn't it?”

“A little more than that,” Kanaya replied, feeling herself warming up for the one discussion in this format she unquestionably knew her way around. “Aside from the immediate benefits to all sick or injured Alternians, our research is also dedicated to long-term benefits for both species. For example, were you aware that most Alternian technology is biologically derived?”

The woman nodded. “I had heard something of the sort, yes. Is that what you are working on?”

“In part,” Kanaya replied, cautious to be precise with the truth. “We currently have more pressing concerns, but it is our hope that we can start introducing new technological developments that actively benefit humanity within ten to twenty years.”

“What sort of benefits are we talking about?” Ms Wayland asked, playing absently with her champagne glass and trying not to look overly eager. Kanaya wondered if her money came from technology; it would certainly explain her interest in the field. Then again, most wealthy humans had an interest in technology; the recent rate of development on their world was frankly astonishing, particularly when compared to the generations of stagnation on Alternia, and a new influx of development could quite literally change the business landscape overnight. Either way, Kanaya was sure the woman would want to understand the implications.

“Alternia is centuries ahead of Earth scientifically speaking,” she told the human woman. “Virtually everything we grew up with and brought with us qualifies as improvement. Differences in technical derivation aside, the only area in which you outstrip us is, ah, curative medicine.”

The woman waved a hand airily. “But surely, if you were all children when you set out...”

“Don't make the mistake of confusing an Alternian childhood with a human one,” Kanaya told her, the words coming out more harsh and bitter than she had intended. As Ms Wayland looked at her in surprise, she hastened to soften her statement. “I simply mean that a disproportionate number of us are what you might consider experts or specialists in various fields.” Searching for an example, she pointed across the room to where a hunched figure sat by the door playing silently on a handheld device. “My friend Sollux, there. In addition to being a powerful psychic and the Helmsman of our vessel, he is quite possibly the greatest computing genius you will ever see.” No idle boast, that. Even using unfamiliar human systems, he could perform feats that most programmers on Earth would never even dream of. For fun.

It was hard not to laugh out loud as the emotions clashed on Ms Wayland's face, half of her wanting to be repulsed by the strange, antisocial boy and the other half wanting to show admiration for his accomplishments. She settled, in the end, for a neutral and diplomatic; “Is that so?”

“Oh, yeah, he's a total whizkid!” Jade interrupted enthusiastically. “He can hack basically anything!”

Kanaya closed her eyes and mentally facepalmed as the woman politely made her goodbyes and absconded from the discussion. Jade watched her go, puzzled. “What? What did I do?” she asked. It was hard to stay angry with her for long, so Kanaya just shook her head in exasperation.

“Never mind,” she said dryly. “But do eat those one at a time, would you?”

Jade agreed amenably before pulling a green phone out of her bag and starting to furiously text her internet friends. The relationship she and Rose had with the mysterious boys rather eluded Kanaya; she was aware that they were sibling pairs, and cognizant of enough human biology to know what that meant from a genetic point of view, but socially it was confusing. After all, from a cultural point of view she and Sollux were Rose's siblings due to their cohabitation, but Dave and his guardian Dirk were still Rose's brothers- despite not living with her- merely because of their parental connection. Jade and John were even more difficult to understand, as they had not even been in contact for several formative years of their lives, and didn't even know who their biological parents were. And then of course there was the fact that Jade and Rose were “bffs”, while Dave and John were “bros”. If they had been Alternian, Kanaya was certain the whole thing would be a tangled mess of various red quadrants. Since they were human, it just seemed to work out. Kanaya had observed that for all their preciousness about concupiscent relationships, they were as a species very relaxed about conciliatory behaviors. She rather envied them that.

At any rate, according to what Rose told her, John had just that afternoon arrived in LA to visit Dave. The current plan called for a surprise visit by the girls in a couple of days after the boys had a chance to settle in, and Jade was clearly both rather excited and having trouble keeping the secret from John. Kanaya decided to leave her to it and checked around the room for the rest of her group. Sollux was no longer curled up by the door, but seemed to have been dragged out to dance by Feferi; his awkward shuffles looked even more pained next to her graceful swaying, but it was an adorable sort of clumsy. Rose was attending to her mother, and Mr Harley was schmoozing a group of well-dressed men his own age with an anecdote that was clearly reducing them to tears of laughter.

That left Eridan, whom Kanaya soon spotted trailing after a young female human. She seemed to be trying quite hard to avoid him, and seeing another place where intervention was needed Kanaya strode over to intercept the seadweller with a restraining hand.

“What do you think you are doing?” she whispered pleasantly, smiling for anyone who might be watching. Eridan hissed and smacked her hand away, almost snagging her emerald glove with his claws.

“C'mon, Kan!” he protested. “I think I got a real fuckin' shot here!”

“If by shot you mean at a restraining order, then I agree,” Kanaya replied. “Can't you control yourself for one evening?”

Eridan almost seemed to crumple in on himself, purple-flecked eyes widening to ridiculous levels. He was almost pitiful, except Kanaya knew that underneath it he was still the same bad-tempered, sulky brat as always.

“I don't hawe anybody,” he said pathetically. “It's not fair, Kan. I'm stuck out on that island or trawellin' around the world all the time and they gang up on me...”

“Perhaps you should have considered that before you committed to your current living arrangements,” Kanaya said calmly. Behind her someone laughed, a harsh bark of amusement. She turned and was surprised to see an Alternian girl of her own age. The stranger wore a floor-length black velvet dress with long, deep cerulean sleeves, and matching handbag bearing what had to be her symbol. The girl's one eye was just starting to show the same shade of blue; the other was covered by a velvet eyepatch tailored to match her dress. Her hair was barely contained in a loose ponytail, wild black locks threatening to break free from their confinement. Her horns were as mismatched as Kanaya's own, one splitting into an upwards crescent while the other was a perfect mirror image of the jade-blood's downwards tilted tip. She was, quite simply, beautiful. Kanaya stared.

Eridan, on the other hand, did not. “Hey, Wris,” he said, immediately perking up. The cerulean-blooded girl snorted.

“Same old looooooooser Eridan,” she said, rolling her good eye as she drew out the vowel. “You'd better not bug me, because I am not here to rekindle old flames.” She grinned wolfishly and Kanaya's blood pusher fluttered. “I have much bigger fish to fry,” she added.

Eridan scowled. “What you talkin' about? We were good together, Wris, you know that!”

“Pfft, kid stuff,” the other Alternian said. She turned to Kanaya and delicately held out a black-gloved hand. “Vriska Serket.”

Kanaya took the hand and shook it gently. “Kanaya Maryam,” she said, still somewhat stunned. The girl was as immediately intoxicating as her friend Rose, and yet so different. Blunt where Rose was subtle, bold where Rose was careful, wild where Rose was controlled. Kanaya thought she might need to get some air soon.

“So what do you want, if you aren't here to talk about past glories?” Eridan asked, sneering. “Heard you gone and been adopted by the Snowman; sure you don't hawe some crime to stick your nose in?”

Vriska tossed her hair over her shoulder. “You're just jealous because _my_ human lusus is the best,” she said haughtily.

“Am not.”

Vriska turned away from Eridan and once again held out a hand to Kanaya. “Do you want to dance?” she asked, the look on her face utterly malicious.

Kanaya knew she should be worrying about that look, and the fact that this was the Snowman's daughter. She should be thinking about human social prejudices and considering appearances. She had to be the sensible one, the stable middle ground between the forces that pulled her in every direction at once. She had to be the Mediator.

But surely, _surely_ , the world could take care of itself for just a few minutes?

“Of course,” she said, and let the strange girl take her by the hand and drag her away from Eridan's protests into the flow of moving figures. It quickly became apparent that Vriska had little idea of how to dance, so Kanaya took the lead and guided her between the whirling couples around them. She felt as though something romantic should have happened- perhaps the music swelling to fill the air, or the people around them vanishing as her focus fell entirely on her dance partner. Instead there were altogether too many elbows and feet and accidental collisions for the ideal, and her mind was filled with a nonsensical, insane attempt to calculate whether she had been more flustered now or earlier in Rose's room.

Vriska leaned in close, her hair brushing against Kanaya's cheek and making the jade-blood's skin tingle with the contact.

“I have something to give to you,” she whispered. One hand slipped out of position on Kanaya's shoulder and dipped into the purse that still hung from Vriska's shoulder, and then the girl was slipping something rectangular and papery into Kanaya's hand. “It's for the cops. I was gonna give it to Eridan but he's a massive whiny moron, so you can have it instead.”

Kanaya swiftly moved the papery thing round to her front, glancing down to see a thick brown envelope. “What is it?” she asked nervously. Vriska grinned.

“Nothing you don't want to give them,” she assured. “It's just a matter of trustworthy sources.” She shrugged innocently. “If anyone directly connected with us were to hand it over, they might not believe the contents, and that would be a terrible thing. Innocent lives would be lost.”

She looked so sincere, standing there with wide eyes, that Kanaya believed her despite her misgivings. “Very well. If it is that vital...”

“Oh, it is,” Vriska reaffirmed, smirking.

Kanaya sighed. “I will go and put it safely in my bag,” she said, heading back to where she had dropped the accessory on a table. Eridan was still malingering nearby, and he sneered as she deposited the envelope.

“Already reeled you into her schemes?” he asked. Kanaya blushed green and was trying desperately to think of a response when Feferi appeared in her field of view, Rose and Sollux in tow. To her dismay, the human girl was frowning at her.

“Feferi tells me that the girl you were just dancing with is the Snowman's daughter,” she stated. Kanaya nodded and Rose pursed her lips in an expression usually reserved for her mother. Feferi looked unhappy too, although in a more disappointed than angry fashion.

“You should be more careful,” Rose said. “Think of the consequences of your actions. This room is full of people who are judging our every word...”

“Guys!” They turned towards the yell, to see Jade charging headlong across the floor towards them, one arm waving towards the large television screen. Kanaya followed the gesture to see that there was a surprisingly large crowd around the thing- one that seemed to be growing. The picture on the screen wasn't their carefully assembled clip show; Kanaya recognized the suited woman as a news anchor and realized that the set had been tuned in to a live signal.

“What is going on?” Rose wondered as the other human girl arrived, face contorted with worry. One of Jade's hands grabbed Feferi by the wrist and the other caught Eridan, and she started to drag them towards the screen, the others hastily following.

“You have to see this, it's awful!” she exclaimed. “I don't even know how they got it, it's a complete disaster!”

Rose was trying to ask what she was talking about and Kanaya was curious too, but as they drew nearer to the TV she heard a familiar voice coming from the somewhat tinny speakers attached to the thing and her question was answered in the worst way possible.

“...not simple like that!” Feferi's voice was saying, static noise crackling over the preserved words. “Some people eely went mad and some people just pretended to and some people culled to defend themselves or other people and some people were dugonging up on anyone they thought might be a threat! What were we supposed to do? Most of us left Alternia to get away from being culled, we couldn't just start getting rid of people because they were inconvenient!”

The recording was terrible quality, Kanaya thought dimly. But it was audible. You didn't have to have been there to hear clearly what had been said, and it was utterly damning.

“How many?”

A glance around showed that the whole room had gathered around the single television, and there was an uncomfortable hush across the crowd.

“We dealt with the ones we had to. We made sure the rest understood.”

Kanaya was starting to feel dangerously surrounded. Her hand reached out of its own accord and wrapped around Rose's. Out of the corner of her vision she saw Sollux wrapping his arms around Feferi, the pair of them seeming to hold each other up, and even Eridan and Jade were standing closer and sharing wary glances. Knowing they were all there made Kanaya feel slightly better. Slightly.

“How many of you are killers?”

The room was holding its breath, waiting for an answer that Kanaya knew it wouldn't like.

“One-third to three-quarters. I don't know any better than that. I'm sorry, I'm so sorry...”

The recording cut out and the clear voice of the news anchor returned. “That tape our breaking news story tonight; are you harboring an Alternian killer? Feferi Peixes caught in a taped confession of guilt...”

Kanaya closed her eyes as what seemed like the entire world turned to stare at their small group, her head suddenly heavy and limp. Rose's hand squeezed her own but it made no difference. She wanted to scream, to run, to bite and claw.

There was a small crackle of energy, a smell of ozone, and a scream of “FUCK!” from Sollux. Despite the murmur of fear that ran through the crowd, Kanaya couldn't help a snort of laughter. It was, to her mind, the perfect summation of the situation.

Fuck, indeed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know it's supposed to be bad practise to describe clothes left, right and centre- but it _is_ Kanaya's chapter. Anyways, plot marches on!


	14. ==> Be The Absent-Minded Adventurous Smartypants

### CHAPTER THIRTEEN ==> Be The Absent-Minded Adventurous Smartypants

Jade Harley had spent most of her childhood exploring the unnamed Pacific Island where she lived with her Grandpa. While he flew off to all corners of the world to see to his business empire and do a little adventuring of his own, she had spent her days climbing cliffs and delving into the odd ruins that stood in the center of the lake. First with Bec and more lately with Eridan or Feferi, she had faced all manner of perils. She knew how to tell when an ancient ceiling was about to fall, how to spot when a seemingly deserted cave was the den of a dangerous creature, how to smell a storm rolling in from the ocean. She knew when to stand and when to run.

Right now fifteen years of instinct were telling her that this room was not safe. She wished she had Bec, or at least her rifle. One glance was all it took to tell her that Eridan felt the same way. He was creepy and annoying and spent way, way too much time slaughtering perfectly innocent animals for Jade's liking- but if there was one thing they could agree on, it was that nobody messed with their family. Even if he was stupid and stubborn and refused to put it that way.

Realizing that she was getting distracted, Jade focused back on the room. The guests were still stunned into silence, but it felt about ready to tip, and she looked around until she spotted her Grandpa. He met her gaze and gave a small shake of his head. This was not the time or the place to fight this battle.

Babble was starting to break out now, eyes turning and indistinct questions being shouted at Feferi. The seadweller princess shrunk back towards Sollux, and Eridan bared his teeth in a challenge. Jade was close enough to hear him growl, low and rumbling, and she gently put a hand on his arm. He whirled and glared at her, and she tugged gently towards the door.

“Come on!” she insisted. “We have to leave, now!”

He hissed but moved with her, and suddenly their whole group was moving away, not quite backing up and not quite turning and fleeing. Their retreat drew more attention, if that was even possible, the crowd drifting after them as if drawn by a magnet. By the time they reached the door they were definitely being pursued, and as Jade bumped softly into Doctor Lalonde they gave up on subtlety and their coats and started to run.

For the second time in as many days Jade ran from a howling mob and the press, firebombs and baseball bats traded for evening gowns and designer labels. She thought that maybe this time was worse, because her shoes weren't even slightly sensible and because as a sign of things to come, this was not exactly hopeful. She caught sight of Rose running beside her, brow furrowed into a deep frown, and tried to give her a reassuring grin that the other girl probably didn't even see. Jade kept running and was one of the first to reach their car, the surprised driver already straightening up from where he had been leaning on the hood and playing with his cellphone. He moved as if to open the door for her but Jade was faster, and as the man caught sight of the other party-goers giving chase he sensibly decided to get in the driver's seat and start the engine.

The passage through the angry crowd was slow and tortuous. Every smack of a hand landing on the vehicle, every slight sway as the press of people shoved against it, every angry glare or anxious shout was a cause for the occupants of the car to flinch. The driver pushed forward slowly, not wanting to run over or crush the mass of people around them, so Jade had more than enough chance to feel scared that the locks on the doors might not hold or that one of the people outside might truly lose it and break a window. Bright lights flashed as the press, crowding them with the guests from the fundraiser, took the opportunity to get tomorrow's front page.

Eventually after an eternity of pushing through the horde, the car made it onto the road and started to pick up speed. The last few straggling members of the crowd were left in their exhaust and Jade looked around at her friends. Feferi was crying, her head buried in Sollux's shoulder as he stroked her hair mechanically, expression blank. Eridan's face was black and stormy, but nowhere near as terrifying as the look Rose wore. Jade had known that her friend could be scary, but this was beyond that- she looked about ready to slowly and methodically tear apart whoever was responsible for the recording. Beside the other human girl, Kanaya was clenching her hands so tight in her dress that she didn't even notice she was tearing the fabric, while Doctor Lalonde began to steadily abuse the minibar for all it was worth. Jade felt a comforting hand on her shoulder and looked up to see the concerned, whiskery face of her Grandpa.

“It'll be alright, old girl,” he said roughly, and she wrapped her arms around his waist in a tight hug because she knew her guardian needed it and so did she. “Let's just get ourselves back to the Mansion...”

“No.”

Jade looked over at Rose, whose furious expression was undercut with a thoughtful current. “Why not?” she asked, dismayed. Rose pinched the bridge of her nose delicately and sighed.

“Think, Jade,” she said. “That was a recording of last night's conversation. None of us made it, so who else had the opportunity?”

Jade gasped as she realized what her friend was getting at. “But... they seemed so nice!” she protested. “I'm sure it can't have been them!”

“A course it was them,” Eridan snapped. “Who the fuck else could it be?” He pouted and looked out of the window. “An' you all had to go blabbin' your big mouths to them.”

“Thure, like you weren't thpilling your gutth right there with uth,” Sollux sneered. “In fact, I theem to remember you taking the pith out of FF and KN for not thaying enough!”

Eridan jolted forwards, his attempt to launch himself at Sollux prevented only by Doctor Lalonde reaching over to hold him in place. “You are fuckin' dead, you filthy pissblood,” he growled. “You hear me? Dead.”

“Enough!” Doctor Lalonde snapped, raising a hand to her temple. “This is not the time, boys.” She closed her eyes and sat back, not moving her hand from across Eridan's chest. “Listen to Rose, dears,” she said dimly, before appearing to fall asleep.

Rose glanced at her mother in surprise before addressing them again. “Since the most likely source of this recording is the detectives who interviewed us, at least one of us and preferably more need to go to the police station and get to the bottom of this.”

Kanaya frowned. “I have to return to Derse Mansion,” she said. “The Matriorb is my responsibility, and following this news story it is entirely possible that our publicly known dwelling will be attacked.”

There was a sharp gasp from Sollux. “Aradia,” he said softly, stiff with shock. Feferi looked up from his shoulder, the shirt stained with Tyrian purple tears and her expression unreadable. Was she jealous of Aradia? Jade knew that Alternian feelings were complicated, and Feferi had confided before that what she had with Sollux was fragile and not yet clearly defined. But if Aradia was in danger, Sollux would definitely have to go to her side.

“Feferi, Sollux and Kanaya will have to return to Derse Mansion with me,” Grandpa said firmly. “And I suspect the same is true of Doctor Lalonde.” He looked down at Jade. “I have to keep them safe, my dear,” he told her, and she understood. Of course she did. Sollux and Kanaya both had something to protect, Feferi couldn't be risked, and Rose's mother was in no fit state for anything. But that just left...

“You want Jade, Eridan and I to go to the police station?” Rose asked, and Grandpa nodded.

“What!?” Eridan and Jade exclaimed at once. Grandpa glared at them both.

“Rose is a very capable young woman, but she will need protecting,” he admonished. “I am trusting you two to be grown-up enough to behave responsibly and work together.”

Jade felt guilty that she had ever objected. “Of course, Grandpa, if you'll look after Bec for me,” she said, secretly a little thrilled that he trusted her this much. He drew her back into a big bear-hug and planted a kiss on top of her head.

“I am so proud of you,” he said gently. Jade wished she knew what to say to make him not scared for her, but she didn't, so instead she gave him a peck on one leathery cheek and pulled back. Eridan huffed sullenly and then yelped as his perfectly coiffed hair was aggressively ruffled.

“And I'm proud of you, too, my lad!” Grandpa said heartily.

“Quit fuckin' messin' up my hair!” Eridan yelled, glaring back at him, but as he smoothed the purple-dyed streak back into place amongst the black locks Jade thought he didn't look totally unhappy.

As the old man leaned over to give new instructions to the driver, Jade pulled her cellphone out of her pocket to start pestering the only friends she had who weren't in the car.

-– gardenGnostic [GG] started pestering ghostyTrickster [GT] at 22:34 –-  
GG: john are you there??  
GG: please i really need to talk to you  
GG: it's all gone completely wrong!! :(

A minute or so passed but there was no response from her brother. Jade sighed and switched to her next option.

-– gardenGnostic [GG] started pestering turntechGodhead [TG] at 22:35 –-  
GG: dave!!!  
GG: dave please!!!  
GG: i really need to talk to someone about this!!! :O

Pesterchum pinged and Jade felt a small smile of relief creep onto her face as she saw the red text appear.

TG: okay chill your tits harley  
TG: strider is here to save the day  
TG: just give the word and i will be right there kicking righteous ass  
TG: whatever sonofabitch upset you i am going to make that fucker my bitch  
TG: they will cry for mercy from my awesome manly strider power  
TG: and ill be all no way you fucking douche  
TG: you hurt jade

Dave was always so funny, but Jade didn't really feel like laughing.

GG: i think this is a bit big even for you!! :(  
GG: and i'm so sorry to bother you when you're busy having your awesome bro night with john!  
GG: but the worst thing that could possibly happen just happened at the fundraiser!!

The response came straight back, barely even a pause when her words hit the chat window. She wondered what was going on with them that meant Dave wasn't paying attention to her brother.

TG: shit that sounds serious  
TG: like meteors about to wipe out all life on earth serious  
TG: someone call the white house and get them to start flipping their shit  
TG: the apocalypse is immanent  
TG: we are all fucked

Jade sighed.

GG: no it's nothing like that!!  
GG: although the white house probably will flip their shit so it kind of is! :(

The rest of the car was unnaturally quiet. Jade glanced over to see Rose staring pensively out of a window at the dark LA streets before the ping of Dave's response drew her eyes back down.

TG: okay  
TG: you need to talk about this  
TG: and clearly for some reason you cant discuss it with my beloved psychoanalyzing sis  
TG: so hit me

Jade chewed nervously at her lip. How much should she tell him? She didn't want to lie or hide anything, Dave was one of her best friends, but she didn't want to deal with him freaking out about the details either.

GG: it's complicated  
GG: but basically there was this awful secret about the alternians that nobody knew! :O  
GG: and we only found out the other night but they are our friends so we were okay with it  
GG: only at the fundraiser tonight the news came on and somebody has found out the secret :(  
GG: so now everyone knows and they are really really mad at us!!! :!

This time there was a pause before Dave's reply. A long one. Jade started to wonder if he had freaked out- but surely he wouldn't? After all, he talked about his school friends all the time and they were both Alternian. Dave wouldn't think bad things about them, would he? When Pesterchum finally alerted her to a response she could barely read it with her hand shaking so badly.

TG: okay  
TG: how bad is this secret exactly  
TG: like are we talking who raided the cookie jar and broke the neighbors window  
TG: or is this some harrowing documentary where all the faces gotta be blurred out type of shit  
TG: because although your problems are clearly a big deal here  
TG: right now i am more thinking how john invited two random hobo trolls to come stay at my place tonight  
TG: and i would sort of like to know if theyre going to murder us in our sleep

It was both not what Jade had been expecting and exactly what she had not wanted him to ask, and even worse she found herself worrying about her friend and her brother. What if the strange Alternians with them were dangerous? They could get badly hurt- she needed to warn them!

Or... was she only thinking that because of what happened on the ship? Yes, she was, she realized. Two days ago she would never have been concerned about Dave or John. They were both tough and could take care of themselves, and they hadn't changed all of a sudden. But now, although she trusted the aliens who were like family to her, she was thinking of the rest of their people as a threat. Dangerous by default. Ashamed of her own reaction, she reminded herself that if Alternians were that deadly they wouldn't have made it for two peaceful years in human society, and set out to tell Dave the same.

GG: well i don't know about the alternians you have staying with you!!  
GG: (although i think that having random strangers in your house sounds a bit dangerous anyway)  
GG: but people are going to say that they are all dangerous now! :O  
GG: you have to remember that they aren't any different than they were before  
GG: they are all still the same people!!  
GG: but everyone is going to be scared of them because we screwed up :(

The reply was gratifyingly swift and Jade smiled reading Dave's words.

TG: well duh  
TG: like i would listen to what people say about rezi and tav  
TG: i already know that chick is mad as a box of quantum cats  
TG: and my brown-blood bro is like a fucking puppy  
TG: all soft and fluffy and helpless  
TG: only a complete monster would want to kick him  
TG: i guess as far as these other two assholes are concerned they can have the same courtesy  
TG: i will not change my opinion on them either regardless of what this terrible secret is  
TG: which is to say one toe outta line and they are out on their asses  
TG: because as you so wisely point out it is fucking moronic to bring suspicious strangers into your house

Jade laughed in relief. Dave wasn't cross. It was going to be okay.

GG: just be careful dave!!! :)

She thought Dave might be smiling too.

TG: yeah you too  
TG: assholes come in all colors of the rainbow  
TG: being a complete fuckwad is an equal opportunities lifestyle  
TG: it wins awards for that shit  
TG: best leveler of men every fucking year  
TG: so dont let them hurt you  
TG: and that includes with what they say  
TG: youre in the right and one day theyll all see that

Jade could have kissed him.

GG: yeah! :)  
GG: thanks dave!!  
GG: you are the best!!!

Dave's reply seemed almost embarrassed.

TG: yeah whatever  
TG: i gotta go monitor your derp brother  
TG: before he starts turning my living room into a homeless shelter or some shit  
TG: see you the day after tomorrow

Laughing out loud, Jade typed a goodbye to Dave and watched him log off. Slipping the phone back into a pocket she was surprised to see that they were already pulling up in front of the police station. As they clambered out of the car, Doctor Lalonde pulled her daughter into a surprisingly sentimental hug. Kanaya took advantage of the opportunity to lean over, pulling a large brown envelope from her purse and holding it out to Jade.

“What's this?” she asked, taking it. Kanaya seemed to blush a little greener.

“A... friend asked me to deliver it to the police,” she replied. “She suggested it was important, and it seems that I won't get the opportunity for a while longer, so...”

“I'll give it to them,” Jade promised, tucking the envelope into her own bag as she ducked out of the car. Grandpa waited until she was standing with the others then saluted Jade and Eridan smartly. Jade returned the gesture then the three of them watched as the car smoothly pulled away, leaving them to walk alone into the police building.

Inside a uniformed officer sat at the front desk. Rose marched up to him and fixed him with a stare, while Jade stared in surprise at the two Alternians and a human woman who seemed to be dozing on the seats in the atrium. The aliens were an odd pair; one tall and unusually muscular blueblood, gently cradling a small greenblooded girl who was curled up in his lap. The human next to them, slim and brunette, was most likely their guardian. They didn't seem to be under arrest and Jade wondered what they were doing there.

“I would like to speak with Detectives Francisco and Sikes immediately,” Rose said sweetly, drawing Jade's attention once more. The man didn't even bother looking up from his paperwork.

“What's this regarding?” he asked, bored. Jade could almost hear Rose's teeth grinding, but she still didn't snap or shout.

“My name is Rose Lalonde. This is Jade Harley and Eridan Ampora. We are here because we have reason to believe that your detectives have put our lives and the lives of every Alternian on this planet in danger.”

The man went pale and scrambled out from behind the desk, darting into the nearby precinct and vanishing into an office at the end. Jade, peering through the door, noted the desks messy with paperwork, the ringing phones, the bustling policemen.

“Miss Lalonde!” exclaimed a voice, and a short dark-haired man came bustling out to greet them. He grabbed Rose's hand and shook it, obviously agitated. “Captain Grazer. I am so sorry, but Detectives Sikes and Francisco aren't here right now. I've put a call out for them to get back in and if you would just wait...”

“We would be delighted,” Rose said, immediately sitting down firmly on the nearest chair. “I am glad to see you are treating this with the seriousness it warrants.”

Eridan snarled at the still-hovering uniformed officer, who hurriedly retreated back to his post behind the reception desk. Jade wandered round to stand nearer Rose and half-sit, half-lean on the desk, feeling oddly useless and lost. She was supposed to be guarding her friend, but she wasn't sure from what or who. She was supposed to deliver Kanaya's package too, but now didn't quite seem like the best moment. Her gaze drifted back to the mysterious Alternians.

“Excuse me, Miss Lalonde, but I am not exactly sure what the situation is,” Captain Grazer was saying apologetically.

“The problem, you fuckin' idiot human, is that someone recorded a priwate an' confidential conwersation we had with your detectiwes,” Eridan yelled. “And now it's all ower the news and people are gonna try and cull us!”

The Captain blanched. “Well, I can assure you that I will be getting to the bottom of this,” he said, swallowing. “In the meantime, if you can tell me what this was regarding, I'll see about getting some additional police protection arranged for you and your fellow Alternian leaders.”

“You should probably also consider preparing for riots, in addition to increased anti-Alternian violence and counter-violence,” Rose said calmly, and that was when Jade stopped listening because the little green-blooded troll was waking up and staring at them. She waved slightly at the girl, and when the girl waved back Jade bounded over.

“Hi!” she exclaimed. The girl smiled with matching enthusiasm, her wide green-flecked eyes crinkling shut. Despite her slight frame, those colored irises meant that she was probably close to Jade's own age.

“The purrlayful meowbeast stretches lazily and greets the stranger with purritty eyes,” she replied, reaching out a clawed finger to point to Jade's own green irises. “She says that her name is Nepurrta and asks what the new girl is called!”

Jade laughed and clapped her hands. Of her friends, only John and Feferi would really roleplay with her, and neither of them had the patience to do it for long. And from her words and the ragged blue fake tail that poked out from under her green coat, this girl clearly had a whole anthropomorphic cat thing going. This was going to be so much fun!

“The bouncy puppy sniffs Nepeta and says that her name is Jade,” she told the Alternian girl. “And she would like to be friends with the playful cat.”

Nepeta's eyes widened in delight. “The meowbeast is really happy that her new furend likes to play!” she squeaked. “She licks her claws nonchalantly and wonders if the barkbeast's other friends want to join in?”

She sounded wistful, and Jade felt almost bad shaking her head. “The puppy's tail stops wagging for a bit because none of her friends like to play these games with her.” She smiled. “But then she perks up again, because she has just met someone to play with, and is curious about the cat and what she is doing here!”

It was Nepeta's turn to look a little downcast. “The meowbeast was out hunting and got curious, and saw something bad,” she said. “Now she is telling the man who draws the purrctures what she paw.”

Jade's eyes widened. “Oh my gosh, are you the witness who saw the Ringmaster?”

Nepeta squeaked and jerked back a little. The motion stirred the large blueblood behind her into wakefulness; Jade couldn't see his eyes open behind the cracked square sunglasses he wore, but his head slowly turned to regard her in a way she would mostly describe as baleful and slightly describe as really creepy.

“Is this human bothering you, Nepeta?” he asked in a low, gravelly voice. Jade felt herself instinctively pull back a little, but the smaller Alternian burrowed into the other.

“No, Equius!” she mewled. “Her name is Jade and she's my new furend!”

Equius' head turned to look at where Rose and Eridan were being attended to by the police Captain, and Jade was fascinated to see a sheen of blue sweat spring up on his skin. “You... are you Jade Harley?”

“Uh huh!” Jade said cheerfully. “Nice to meet you!”

A heavy blue blush began to spread under the sweat. “Oh dear,” Equius said. “I am so sorry, Miss Harley.”

“For what?” she asked, genuinely curious at his sudden switch from intimidating to embarrassed. The big Alternian mopped nervously at his forehead with a large palm.

“I was not aware of your identity,” he said in the same rumbling tones. “I apologize for any offense I may have foolishly caused and beg your forgiveness.”

Jade giggled. “You haven't offended me at all, silly!” she told him. “I was just asking Nepeta about why you were here and she got a little upset, which is completely my own fault.”

“I see,” Equius said solemnly, glancing down at the small girl tucked into his side. “My moirail has been through a distressing experience,” he told Jade. “I am sorry if she was unhelpful at all.”

Jade pulled a face. “I'm not mad with either of you, you know,” she replied. “Stop being so stiff!”

“Oh dear,” Equius said, sweating heavily. “I think I need a towel. Excuse me.”

As he got to his feet and darted for what Jade presumed to be the bathroom, Nepeta unfolded and looked back at her, face serious.

“The meowbeast pounces on the puppy and holds her down,” she said. “She thinks it's only fair that she knows why the puppy is here too.”

Jade looked awkwardly at the ground. She didn't think she could roleplay this. “My friends and I said some things which got overheard, and now everyone is finding out about what happened on the ship,” she said miserably. Nepeta looked shocked and Jade couldn't meet her face. “I'm sorry,” she added. “We should have done better.”

A gentle clawed hand rested on her arm and she looked over at the troll girl, who was smiling.

“The meowbeast lets the puppy up and pounces on her tail playfully,” she said. “She thinks that both of them are too unhappy and they should just play together for now and worry about other stuff later.”

Jade smiled. “The puppy likes that idea and decides that the meowbeast needs to be _licked_ a whole bunch!”

“Mrawr!” Nepeta was giggling as she raised her hands to push back Jade, who was sticking her tongue out and pretending to lean close. “The meowbeast has claws! She will scratch!”

“No scratching, Nepeta honey,” muttered the human woman on the bench. Jade glanced at her. “Is that your Mom?” she asked. Nepeta shook her head and giggled at the idea.

“Ms Miller is one of our carers at the group house,” she said, playing thoughtfully with the cuffs on her overly large shirt. “She drove here today to bring us home-made sandwiches and hot chocolate and to purrtect us and take us back when the purrcture man is done, but it's all taking ages!”

“Oh,” Jade said, and there didn't seem to be much else to say. She had been adopted so young that she didn't really remember where she had lived before Grandpa. She knew that there were thousands of Alternians still in the system, but she still found it sad that her new friend didn't have a real home. Nepeta didn't seem too unhappy about it, though, and she remembered that adopted or not living on Earth was a completely alien experience for most Alternians. Usually in a good way.

“SIKES! FRANCISO!”

The Captain's furious explosion was more than enough to draw Jade's attention, and she watched as the two detectives in question confusedly walked over from the entrance to where Rose sat. In that moment she realized that there was no way they had made the recording. If they had known what was happening they would have looked guilty, not confused.

“Excuse me,” she said to Nepeta, and when the other girl nodded she darted across the room to stand by Rose. Her friend remained silent, but Eridan wasted no time laying into the two men.

“Oh, here you are,” he spat. “You gonna fuckin' explain why you felt the need to spill everythin' we told you last night?”

“What the hell are you talking about?” Sikes asked, an edge of anger in his voice. Francisco laid a calming hand on his shoulder and looked to Rose and the Captain. The latter obliged.

“Detectives, since you seem to have missed it, every news station in the country is currently broadcasting a conversation you had with Miss Peixes regarding the Alternian predilection for- I believe the word is _culling_.” He paused to glare at Rose, Eridan and Jade. “While I can't say I care for the secrecy here, I care even less for the mess this is going to make of law and order in this city. What the hell were you thinking?”

“Captain,” Francisco said slowly, “I believe I know what conversation you are alluding to and... neither of us recorded it. Even if we had, we would not be so dangerously cavalier with the tape.”

“You fuckin' liars!” Eridan yelled. “Who else could it a been? This is fuckin' unconscionable!”

Sikes threw his hands in the air in exasperation. “Great!” he shouted. “Just blame us! Maybe your house is bugged, did you think of that? No, because you'd rather blame us for trying to do our goddam jobs!”

“Detective, that is enough!” the Captain snapped, red-faced. “Unless you can think of another credible perpetrator...”

“The driver,” Jade said. Everyone fell silent and turned to look at her. She met their gazes with a growing certainty; the idea had only occurred to her a moment earlier, but...

“He was right outside,” she said. “I remember Detective Sikes bumped into him on the way out. And he was in the room to give a statement about the attack, so he knew you were going to ask us some other questions.”

Rose's eyes narrowed. “And he wasn't at work today, either,” she mused. “I had put that down to the stress of yesterday's events, but it would certainly give him the opportunity to sell the story.”

The policemen all seemed to consider the idea for a moment. “It seems plausible,” Detective Francisco agreed. “Had he ever shown signs of anti-Alternian sentiment before?”

“I... don't know?” Jade said, blushing red. “I never really paid attention.”

“He was always slightly more perfunctory than was necessary with Feferi and Kanaya,” Rose said slowly. “But he always seemed fairly impatient anyway, so I didn't think much of it.”

Eridan growled. “I'm gonna gut him!” he howled, digging his claws into the smooth surface of the nearby reception desk and splintering the plywood. “I'm gonna tear his fuckin' guts out an' feed them to him!”

“I really don't think that will be necessary,” Rose said, as Jade slowly reached out and pulled the Alternian's hand away from the desk, gently rubbing her thumb across his knuckles in a soothing motion. Detective Sikes snorted.

“Great,” he snapped. “Now we have another suspect, can we get on with our jobs? Or do you have anything else you'd like to accuse us of? How about taking bribes, or dealing drugs?”

“Sikes,” said Captain Grazer warningly, before turning back to Rose. “I am not happy with your unfounded accusation of my Detectives,” he said. “I hope you understand that.”

Rose inclined her head politely. “Indeed I do, Captain, and I apologize profusely for jumping to conclusions. We withdraw any aspersion cast on their character at once and in full, and request your assistance in tracking down the true culprit.”

The Captain looked across at the still-fuming Sikes and his impassive partner, and gave a single nod. “Naturally,” he said. “And I will see to that protection detail immediately.”

“For them too,” Jade said, pointing to where Equius had rejoined his moirail. “They should be kept safe.”

“I agree,” Detective Francisco said, reaching into his inner jacket pocket to pull out a brown envelope. “They've been invaluable in creating this sketch, and after what that girl has been through we can hardly do any less.”

The Captain held out a hand. “May I?”

Jade craned to see as he tugged the paper out and looked at it. She caught a glimpse of a thin Alternian face, with tall horns and a lazy grin. The Captain studied it for a moment before passing it back.

“This is our suspect?” he asked, sounding surprised.

“Yup,” Sikes said, sounding only slightly smug. Captain Grazer nodded.

“Run it by the witness, then get some copies made up,” he said. “I'm going to make some calls.”

As the Captain made his way back to his office and the Detectives turned to go, Jade reached out and grabbed Sikes by the arm, pulling Kanaya's package from her purse.

“Um, I'm supposed to deliver this to the police?” she said, noticing that Rose was giving her an odd look. Sikes frowned.

“What is it?” he asked. Jade shrugged helplessly.

“I don't know. It came from a friend of a friend.”

As Detective Francisco walked over to watch his partner tease the envelope open, Rose leaned in to whisper in Jade's ear.

“You do realize that Kanaya was dancing with the Snowman's daughter? That package is almost certainly from her.”

Jade's eyes widened in alarm. “Should we tell them?” she asked. Rose snorted delicately.

“I think our credibility has been quite damaged enough for one night, don't you?”

Jade blushed and looked back round to where the policemen were examining several pages that had clearly come from the envelope. To her surprise, they looked utterly gobsmacked.

“This... this is...” Detective Francisco said.

“The freakin' motherlode,” Sikes finished reverently. “Jesus. The Midnight Crew... but who...?” He looked over at Jade. “Thanks for delivering this,” he said, so sincerely that she felt a little guilty. “Come on, George, let's go get working.”

The two men walked off. Jade looked around and saw Eridan leaning over and breathing heavily with suppressed rage. She walked over to put her hand on his and squeeze it, slipping an arm around his shoulders. He stiffened and ignored it, muttering darkly, but she ignored him. She was used to his bad moods by now but the LAPD weren't and she wasn't going to let him be such a silly billy with all these people around.

As she glanced towards the seats at the wall she could see Nepeta furiously drawing something on a scrap of paper. The young green-blood held it up triumphantly, and Jade could make out a rough image of herself and Eridan holding hands under a diamond and a question mark.

Oh, wait, she knew this one! Diamond was for moirallegiance!

Wait, moirallegiance?

Jade dropped Eridan's hand like it was suddenly red-hot and decided that he could definitely take care of himself for a while.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Might end up posting the next chapter a day early; not sure yet. I have time off but I might just spend it being lazy. :)


	15. ==> Be The Cheerful Addict Motherfucker

### CHAPTER FOURTEEN ==> Be The Cheerful Addict Motherfucker

Gamzee Makara was not asleep. The apartment was dark and quiet save for the glow of the streetlamps outside and Karkat's soft breathing. Gamzee was cuddled close to him, arm rising and falling with his moirail's chest as he watched the glowing green numbers on the microwave. Two fifty. Blink. Blink. Blink. Two fifty one. Hypnotizing.

He knew he should sleep, take advantage of having somewhere fairly safe and comfortable to rest. For all that he had argued with Karkat the whole time, the Dave kid had found them a whole mess of blankets and comforters and set them up on the floor in the open-plan living room slash kitchen. He and his friend John had retired to sleep in another room and there had been some pretty dire warnings against stealing stuff, but Gamzee hadn't really considered doing that. There didn't seem much point when so much was being freely offered anyway.

Blink. Blink. Blink. Two fifty four. Gamzee didn't want to sleep, because sleep was a thief. It stole hours off your life and all it ever gave back was nothing and nightmares. Normally he didn't mind getting the former so much, but this place was a straight-up miracle and he didn't want to miss a second of being here. Sleeping he could do any time. Getting to just lie there and chill was a far rarer commodity.

Two fifty nine. There was a funny looking plush puppet with a big-ass nose on the window sill, identical to the dozens of others that were scattered all over the place. Gamzee stared at the silhouette and wondered if one of them would be missed if he took it, even though he'd just been thinking how he wouldn't do that shit. He kind of liked them, all the bright pretty colors, and they were just so motherfucking soft. Karkat wasn't so keen, though, and Dave would probably get mad if he took anything even if there were lots about. John wouldn't mind. He was a wicked awesome guy, always happy and smiling like that. He was kind of like Nepeta that way, except Gamzee didn't like to think about Nepeta so he focused on the blinking microwave light again. Blink. Blink. Blink.

Three oh six. Fuck. The time was going past too quickly. Used to be that it went slower, but that was back on Alternia when he had his pies. Gamzee hated his fucking pies for what they had done to his thinkpan. He missed his pies too, although it wasn't as bad as it had been when the sopor first ran out. He mostly missed his special miracle pills these days. Without either, there wasn't anything to make the quiet little voices in his thinkpan go away. He really didn't like the voices. They said all sorts of things that he didn't want to be hearing, over and over and over and over until he up and started listening just to make them stop bugging him. Then he did stuff that some deep dark part of him liked but left the rest of him screaming in his own head. Now when stuff got bad he would go to Karkat, because although his moirail couldn't do anything to make the voices weaker he could make Gamzee stronger. It was easy to remember why he shouldn't listen when the lying little fucks tried to make him hurt his palebro.

Blink. Blink. Blink. Three fifteen. Gamzee was thirsty, so reluctantly he left Karkat to get up and wander to the kitchen sink, padding softly across the bare fake wood floor. He poured water directly into his hand because he couldn't find a tumbler in the dark. So motherfucking dark, these Earth nights with their pretty lone silver moon. One handful of water. Two handfuls. Three. Then he paused to look at the glimmering pool in his palm because it was just so sparkly and beautiful in the streetlight through the window.

A rush of wind. A slight click. There, a tumbler by the sink where there wasn't one before. Gamzee picked it up and studied it, filled it with water and shut off the faucet. Then he set the drink down and closed his eyes, listening. Traffic in the city streets. The hum of electronics. Karkat breathing, rougher than before. Another breath, slow and soft but close behind him.

It's rude not to acknowledge when a motherfucker helps you out. “Thanks,” Gamzee said to the figure in the darkness. Another rush of wind and he opened his eyes just in time to see a strange human-shaped puppet slide onto the counter beside his drink. Gamzee reached out slowly and gently ran a finger down the thing's cheek. It was weird and creepy and pretty fucking amazing, too, smiling like a cheerful motherfucker.

“You dig Li'l Cal.”

Gamzee turned his head to see a human man leaning against the countertop. He looked sort of like Dave only older, which meant he was probably the Bro guy that they had been told about earlier that night. He looked between the man and the puppet and grinned.

“Motherfucking sweet,” he said, the English words coming more easily to his tongue after his earlier slam poetry battle with Dave. The human was a motherfucking master of the Alternian art, even if he did up and call it “rap” for some reason, and he had said that his Bro was even more wicked skilled than he was. Gamzee had motherfucking missed slam poetry; Karkat was great and all, but it just wasn't his thing.

Now, however, did not seem like the right time to invoke the mirthful rhythms and the battle of the beat. Dave's human lusus stared at him impassively from behind pointed shades and Gamzee wondered why both of them wanted to go hiding their eyes like that. Wasn't like it made any difference for humans; they all had the same color blood. The same impossible color as Karkat's, and wasn't that just the biggest miracle of them all?

“Thought so,” the man said. “Gamzee, right?”

“Yeah,” Gamzee agreed, still running gentle fingers across the puppet. He wouldn't mind having something like that himself. Maybe his could be gray and have horns, though. His own troll puppet- that would be bitchtits wicked.

The little voices had some ideas on that score, but he told them to shut up because that shit was all wrong.

“You know, I was wonderin' how long my brother was gonna keep feedin' you two before you ended up here,” the human continued. “Should have guessed the Egbert kid would push the issue.”

Curious, Gamzee looked over, and the man shrugged. “What kind of shitty lusus would I be if I let my charge go off and do dangerous stuff without me keepin' an eye on him?”

Gamzee giggled. “Shit man, you all up and know what a lusus is about?”

“Sure do,” the human agreed. “Along with a whole bunch of other stuff.” He strolled over, casually picked up the puppet and cradled it in his arms. “But not everything. You, for example. You go places. You vanish.” He stared at Gamzee through unreadable sunglasses. “Not a lot of people can lose me that easily.”

Gamzee returned the stare with a languid grin. He could remember the sensation of being followed, the way the back of his neck had prickled. At first he had wondered if it was Karkat, then when he realized it wasn't he had assumed it was some random stalker and he could handle their shit. Either way he had just moved instinctively to lose his pursuer. Knowing it had been this guy was making the voices get louder. They thought it was fucking impudent of this alien to follow him about. That this motherfucker needed to be put in his place, shown who the true and righteous boss was here.

_Beat him tear him teach him cull him._

No. The guy was a lusus protecting his charge. That was cool. He was chill.

_Unfair unreasonable insolent tert SCUM._

No. Not true. Wait, shit, how long had he been standing there just staring?

“I don't motherfucking like being followed,” Gamzee said. A true thing, but the human didn't seem happy. Didn't seem unhappy either, mind. He leaned forward until his glasses were less than an inch from Gamzee's eyes. The troll could smell alcohol and sweat and the residue of a smoke machine on the man's clothes, but nothing on his breath. Sharp and clear, looking right into Gamzee's head. Right into his motherfucking soul.

“You're fucking insane,” he said. Gamzee stared back blankly.

_HOW DARE THIS MOTHERFUCKER JUDGE US!_

No. On his world, in his hive, with his charge. He had every right. Not as if he got it wrong, either. Somewhere in a buried file that Gamzee didn't have there was a special bit of paper that said the same thing, only in fancier language. He didn't understand a whole lot about Alternian thinkpans, but by human standards he was completely grubfuck and he knew it.

“How do you all up and figure that?” Gamzee asked, curious. The man stepped back and slung the puppet called Li'l Cal up onto his shoulder.

“I've seen a few humans broken in the head,” he said, tapping his own skull for emphasis. “First fuckers to kick off a fight, last ones to back down. You're not so different.” He tilted his head to the side. “That goin' to be a problem?”

Gamzee shook his head vigorously. “Nah. I got my palebro to keep me all good,” he said. “I ain't gonna up and start nothing.”

“Cool,” the man said. He looked over to where Karkat was sleeping and inclined his head. “Sounds like he could use you over there.”

Gamzee turned and sure enough, Karkat was thrashing, his former peaceful breathing turned to ragged gasps and sobs while Gamzee was distracted.

“Motherfuck!” he cursed, racing across the room to throw himself down beside his moirail and wrap him in an enveloping hug. Karkat wriggled and struggled and cried in his grip, red tears pouring down his face to dampen Gamzee's arm.

“Shh,” he whispered, reaching one hand up to pet his moirail's hair. He wanted so badly to poke those little miracle hornbeds, trigger his bro's submission reflex to make him chill out and end the bad dream trip, but if he did that anywhere that wasn't one hundred percent safe Karkat would never forgive him. There hadn't been anywhere like that since their hidey-hole on the ship, but Gamzee wasn't going to forget about that magic miracle trick just in case.

“Is he okay?” the human asked. Gamzee had forgotten he was even there.

“It's just motherfucking nightmares,” he told the man. “He gets them bad.” It was true, more or less. Even if he'd been inclined to go into more detail, he didn't think his moirail would appreciate it. They'd been quadrants for almost half a sweep before Karkat had told him why he woke up weeping instead of angry like a normal troll. The dreams full of death and blood and killing were pretty normal, except that Karkat tended to experience them as an onlooker instead of a participant. Stranger by far were the dreams he described where everything was perfect. Gamzee had listened to him whisper in wonder about a world where everyone was kind and nobody got culled and everything was a beautiful miracle, tears pouring down Karkat's face when he explained how hard it was to actually be there and live that and then wake up to harsh, bitter reality. Gamzee never told him how much he loved to hear about those dreams, about the other Gamzee in them who never had to worry about what he might do because of the noise in his own head and the other Karkat who smiled and laughed like he knew his bro really wanted to but never could.

It hadn't been until they were on Earth that his moirail had dared to share the other dream with him, the recurring one that made him scream and scream and scream until he woke up with a vicious curse on his lips, checking his wrists every few seconds to be sure his hands were still attached. Gamzee didn't think the human needed to hear about those dreams at all. He could feel the man still watching them, but he was all up and used to being watched by strange motherfuckers. He concentrated on wrapping himself around Karkat and making a low soothing rumble in his chest until his moirail stopped thrashing and his crying died down to a few quiet residual sobs. Gamzee kept gently shooshing him, wondering at how small and fragile Karkat felt. He was so aggressive and loud and expansive when awake that it was easy to forget how delicate he was under all that.

_Snap him crush the little bones paint the walls with the HERETICAL MUTANT MOTHERFUCKING BLOOD._

Gamzee giggled because it was the most stupid thing he had ever heard the little voices say. Like he would ever do anything to hurt that steady red pulse. Karkat trusted him completely and nothing would ever, ever make him turn on that. Especially not some motherfucking idiot voices that didn't know a miracle when they were all pressed up next to it. And it was so soothing to have his little miracle bro wrapped up in his arms, breathing in and out in time with his heartbeat. He was so peaceful now that Gamzee knew he had to be all up and dreaming about the beautiful miracle place. The tall indigo-blood closed his eyes to imagine a little better what his moirail must be seeing, and smiled softly as the world behind his eyes took shape. Didn't matter if it wasn't real, not for now.

Gamzee played happily in the imaginary world for a while, but after a bit the thoughts began to bleed and run, and smiles started to turn to snarls. The colors changed, became more vibrant and sanguine, until the games Gamzee was playing had his little voices singing joyfully. His dark self painted pictures across everywhere and deep inside his own head Gamzee cried and pleaded and tried to escape from the nightmares he was building one work of bloody art at a time.

He was woken by someone gently shaking him, and his instincts were all up and ready to lash out at his attacker when he smelled the warm earthy scent of Karkat and chilled the fuck out. He opened his eyes to see daylight filling the room and his moirail looking down at him with the sort of sad concern he only got after the good dreams. Gamzee reached up a hand and papped softly at the red tear-tracks on Karkat's face.

“Hey, motherfucker,” he said, smiling. Karkat's face metamorphosed into a scowl which was okay because Gamzee knew what he really meant by it.

“Get moving, you lazy fuckwit,” the shorter troll grumbled in Alternian. “The humans are waking up and I want to get both our asses through the ablution block before we get kicked back onto the street with the garbage.”

Gamzee stretched lazily and yawned. “Chill, bro,” he replied in the same language. “They ain't gonna just throw us out.”

“The hell they're not,” Karkat replied, grabbing him by the scruff of the neck and bodily dragging him upright. “That Strider asshole doesn't want us in his hive in the first place and the Egbert kid will forget all about us as soon as something mildly amusing happens to distract his half-grown thinkpan. Trust me.”

Gamzee gently pushed his moirail's hands away and patted him gently on the cheek. “If you're all up and worried, why don't you go get your ablution on first?” he offered. “I can kick it out here 'til you're done.”

Karkat glanced towards the bathroom door and chewed his lip nervously. “You... you don't mind?”

Gamzee laughed. “Fuck, no,” he replied easily. “I ain't ever been all that great with hygiene and all that shit.”

“You are fucking disgusting,” Karkat said, but there was no sting in his words. He gave Gamzee a swift squeeze of a hug then darted into the human ablution block, the door clicking shut behind him. Gamzee watched the door for a few seconds, then wandered over to the kitchen sink. A full tumbler of water sat by it, which was a motherfucking miracle because he was wicked thirsty. Shame it wasn't Faygo, but there weren't nothing wrong with water, and Gamzee happily picked it up and drank it all in one long chug.

“Impressive.”

Gamzee turned to see the Dave human standing with his elbows on the kitchen counter, close to where his Bro had been the night before. Gamzee figured that one of the tightly closed doors led into the lusus man's room, and that some of the squiggly human symbols on the doors marked which, but the rather limited success of his school-feeding in human alphanumeric characters had diminished to complete ignorance over months of disuse. Rather than worry about which room was Dave's and which his Bro's, Gamzee gave the human boy a wide smile.

“Hey, all good morning and shit,” he said. To his surprise, Dave wandered closer and studied him carefully from several feet away. There was something disquieting about the scrutiny, and to cover his discomfort and help smother the noisy little voices Gamzee got himself a second glass of water from the faucet. The human boy waited until it reached his mouth before speaking again.

“Where's your asshat moirail at?”

Gamzee hissed into the drink and narrowed his eyes, before forcing his face back under control. “Man, he's all cleaning up,” he said, waving a hand towards the bathroom. “Wanted to be getting his bathe on. Thought you'd be throwing us out all soon-like.” He tilted his head curiously, studying Dave.

The human snorted. “Damn fucking right I'm throwing you out,” he said. “And you're leaving, got it? I don't care if John invites you two to be his best snuggle-buddies forever; you are turning him down and getting the fuck out of here. Understand?”

Gamzee did understand, and it hurt more than he had thought it would. Maybe Karkat had been right to be so pessimistic, but Gamzee didn't want to live that way. It would make a brother go blind inside thinking like that, close his mind up to the miracles. Remembering that he nodded and drank the water and told the little voices to shut the hell up because even if they weren't wanted here they had still got dinner and somewhere warm and cozy to sleep and one, maybe even two showers each. That was the motherfucking bitchtits.

Dave studied him and then walked over to one of the cupboards. “You want breakfast, we got a metric fuck-ton of cake from Egbert senior,” he said, and holy fuck there was another miracle right there. Plates turned out to be a “find one and wash it” affair, but next to two shelves that held nothing but weaponry the thermal hull also contained apple juice and, miraculously, orange Faygo. Dave left Gamzee to sort his own meal out, either from knowing all kinds of shit about trolls or from not caring none any which way. Gamzee was just glad for the space as he cut himself a thick slice of chocolate cake and snagged one of the wicked elixirs. He was about halfway through his breakfast when one of the two bedroom doors opened and John Egbert emerged grinning.

“Hey Dave!” he declared chirpily. “Hey Gamzee!”

“'Sup, Egbert?” Dave said, his sunglasses not moving from staring at the troll as John sat next to him at the breakfast bar and groaned at the sight of the cake.

“Sorry dude, this is the only food in the house,” Dave said, taking another bite from a blueberry muffin. “We got some apple juice, but you better get to it fast because it is going faster than a bad taco through a fat kid's lower intestine.”

Gamzee swigged his Faygo happily. He motherfucking loved Faygo. It tasted virtually identical to the soda he used to drink back on Alternia, which was probably some sort of special miracle in its own right. John went fishing in the fridge and pulled out a different orange soda, this one called Fanta or some shit like that.

“Careful,” Dave said, swigging his apple juice. “Bro is going to flip his shit if you two drink all his crappy soda.”

John, grinning widely and muttering something about prankster's gambits, poured himself a glass of the orange fizz just as Gamzee finished up the chocolate cake and carefully licked the last crumbs off his plate.

“That,” he said thoughtfully. “Was motherfucking amazing.”

John pulled a face. “Ugh,” he said. “How? How can even aliens like that stuff?”

Dave leaned back from the breakfast bar. “Sorry dude, hate to break it to you, but your dad is the god of baking and us mere mortals live in eternal anticipation of the morsels he graces us with. Only you can withstand the ambrosial charms of his work because you are a goddam freak of nature.”

As the dark-haired human groaned, Gamzee's eyes went wide. “Your lusus made this?” he asked, wonderingly.

John nodded, face all screwed up in disgust. “He never stops,” he practically wailed.

Gamzee stared at him. “Motherfuck,” he said, confused beyond comprehension. “If I had a lusus made this miracle cake all the time, I wouldn't never stop eatin' it.”

“Told you,” Dave said, pouring himself a second glass of apple juice. “John is a freak of nature. He's like a changeling. The real John Egbert got stolen at birth by some tiny dancing winged assholes who left some pixie brat they didn't want instead. Probably because he didn't like cake.”

“Daaave!” John said, shoving his friend in the shoulder. “I'm not that weird!”

Dave raised a quizzical eyebrow. “Oh yeah?” He took a swig of his drink then set the glass down. “Dude, I saw you lug that suitcase around. That thing weighs like ten tons. I mean, I think there might actually be an elephant hiding in there. No, scratch that, it's the whole fucking herd of elephants. You are built like a toothpick, how did you even move it?”

John grinned proudly. “My dad says I've got loads of mangrit,” he said. Dave grimaced.

“No, dude. That's total bullshit.” He waved a hand towards Gamzee. “You gotta be a troll like this asshole to be that strong. I take back the pixie thing, you are a troll. It's the only explanation. I'll get Lalonde's gray sis to back me up, she knows all this this biology shit.”

John laughed and leaned towards his friend. “Or maybe you're just puny because you eat all the cake!” he joked, poking at Dave's belly. Gamzee joined him in laughing as the blond boy shot backwards and nearly fell off his stool. They were still giggling as the bathroom door clicked open and a damp but dressed Karkat emerged and glared at all of them.

“What the fuck is going on?” he demanded. Gamzee slipped off his stool and pushed his palebro up to the table.

“Chocolate cake and soda miracles, bro,” he said, smiling. “I'm gonna go make myself all clean and shit, then we can head out.”

John looked over from where he was still poking at Dave. “Oh, do you have to go so soon?” he asked, disappointed. Karkat opened his mouth, closed it again, looked at Gamzee and then at Dave, and picked up on the slight nods that both of them gave him.

“Yeah, we're leaving,” he growled. “What, you think we were going to stay here and put up with your inane fucking drivel for even the tiniest fraction of an instant longer than we absolutely have to? Not a fucking chance.”

Gamzee could hear Egbert starting to object as he slipped into the ablution block, ducking to get his horns under the door frame, but with both Dave and Karkat against him he knew the boy wouldn't win. Instead of worrying about it, he slipped into the shower and with his head bowed turned the heat right up, enjoying the scalding water as it hit his skin. He had showered the night before, Dave insisting that they both get clean before he lent them any bedding, but Gamzee was pretty sure there was still some grime washing out and spiraling down the drain with the white steams of soapy bubbles. He watched the water spin for a while and wondered how it all knew to go in the same direction before remembering that he was supposed to be showering, not spacing out.

Karkat had been right; it felt good to clean up properly. It would have been even nicer if he could have really taken his time over it, but aware of Dave's shrinking patience and the fact that his lusus could easily wake and make his presence felt Gamzee kept his ablutions to a bare minimum. He felt a funny weight in his chest and saw some purple mixed in with the water; looking down at his hands he saw them clenched into fists, claws drawing blood from his palms. He hadn't even felt it. Motherfucking weird.

_How dare those terts treat us this way how fucking dare they MAKE THEM PAY!_

Shut up shut up SHUT UP.

He was shaking. Fuck, he needed some sopor. But there wasn't any, so he stayed in the shower as long as he dared, as long as it took to wrestle himself back into some shaky facade of sanity. He climbed out of the ablution trap slowly, dried himself off on the same towel he had used before and pulled his clothes back on with more care than was strictly necessary. He felt like his skin was trying to crawl off and his head was buzzing, his whole jaw sore with the way he was grinding his teeth. He had to stay strong though, for his palebro. Karkat needed him and Gamzee was no use at all if he lost it, so he had to hang on. Maybe in a bit, when they'd found a good place to settle down for the day, he could get some pale snuggle time. That would be one wicked miracle.

A cry of alarm split the air, and Gamzee recognized Karkat's voice. Before he had even processed the thought the indigo-blood had burst into the living room, teeth bared and claws ready to rend who or whatever had just scared his moirail. In a flash he saw Karkat pinned against the couch by a strange troll, a girl with opaque red glasses and a teal symbol on her bright crimson top. Everything else was obscured by the purple mist that descended on his vision. Gamzee growled and started to charge the bitch.

“No! Stop!”

His moirail's voice made him hesitate, which was just enough time for John and Dave to step between him and his quarry. Gamzee hissed and flexed his claws, ready and willing to tear them both limb from limb to rescue Karkat.

“Shit! Gamzee, fucking no! Let me _up_ , you crazy bitch, you're freaking him out!”

The stranger backed up slightly and barely stumbled as Karkat shoved her the rest of the way, scrambling across the couch and ducking past John to grab Gamzee's face with both hands. “It's okay,” he said in Alternian, eyes so wide with worry that he even forgot to be frowning, which was a wicked serious concern. “Gamzee? Fucking speak to me, you rotpanned idiot, tell me we're okay here!”

Gamzee realized he was still up and growling, and stopped, bending his head to bump it gently against his moirail's as he replied in the same tongue. “Shit, palebro,” he muttered. “You all up and scared the motherfucking daylights outta me, yelling like that.” He raised his head again to glare at the strange troll. “And then I all saw this sister pinning you down...”

The strange troll cackled, and it was a miracle if she didn't sound as loosely hinged as Gamzee was feeling. “He tastes like cherries!” she declared, licking her lips. Karkat turned his head to glower at her.

“Doesn't mean you have to fucking lick me, you insane freak!” he yelled, switching back to English. “And what does that even mean, anyway? I am not a fucking dessert! Multiple witnesses can attest that I am not in any way, shape or fashion _sweet_! I definitely do not taste of any kind of fucking fruit!”

“Oh, yes you do,” the troll girl replied, grinning widely. “I have the very best taste, and your skin might be boring old concrete dust but your mutant cherry blood is _delicious_.”

Karkat shrank back into Gamzee's arms and the taller troll could feel his fragile little moirail shaking a little. He couldn't blame him for being afraid. The hemospectrum was dead in theory, but in practice that just meant that the highbloods who liked to be all lording it over the lowbloods had been joined by lowbloods who liked to get their indiscriminate vengeance on. He and his bro had ditched their symbols to avoid becoming targets, but they were old enough that someone close enough to see their eyes would know. If an indigo-blood was a perfect target for a lowblood gang, a mutant was pretty much open game for anyone. Gamzee snarled a warning at the stranger.

“Jesus fuck, will you stop that?” Dave said. Gamzee turned to glare at him instead, and the human folded his arms stubbornly. “Dude, she's blind. Tasting shit is like, how she sees or something, and she has a major thing for red.” He nodded down at his own red and white shirt. “Believe me, I know how freaky it can get, but she isn't going to eat you or anything. Swear on my very best ironic heart-print boxers.”

Gamzee stopped growling, and looked back at the girl, who lifted her red glasses to reveal blank crimson eyes. “I had an accident back on Alternia,” she said, still grinning. “Terezi Pyrope. You?”

Gamzee waved, then remembered that she couldn't see that, and dropped the hand awkwardly. “I'm Gamzee,” he told her. “And this red-blooded miracle bro here is my moirail, Karkat.”

“Quit fucking telling strangers our names!” Karkat protested, wriggling out of Gamzee's grasp before rounding on Terezi. “What the hell malfunction is there in your thinkpan?” he asked, waving an arm in an expressive gesture that was almost certainly lost on her. “You think it's okay to just jump on people and start tasting them? How have you not been culled already? What are you even doing here?”

Terezi wrinkled her nose up and stuck her tongue out at Karkat. Gamzee admired how long and pointy it was. “I am one of Dave's very best friends and this is his apartment,” she said. “You are the one who should have to explain your presence!”

“Oh!” John said, visibly perking up now he had something to contribute. “That was me! I invited them in!” He flushed slightly. “They, um, didn't have anywhere else to go,” he explained. Terezi sniffed the air thoughtfully.

“Oh, yes,” she said, chuckling. “I can smell that. The city is all over these two!”

“Hey! We fucking bathed!” Karkat snapped. “Twice!”

“Told you she was good, dude,” Dave said, shrugging. “But seriously, 'Rezi, what gives? Not that I'm not delighted to see your crazy blind ass whenever, and I think Egbert might have actually jizzed his pants when he opened the door...”

“Hey! Dave!”

“... but I thought the plan was a shitty movie marathon at Tav's place this evening, not an early-morning color tasting bonanza.”

Terezi clapped her hands together delightedly. “Oh, Dave, I had to come here! I have the best thing for us to do together today!”

“Oh! What is it?” John asked, excited. Terezi started to fumble in one pocket of her jeans.

“Where is it... see, I was staying over at Matt's place last night...” The humans looked vaguely confused as she switched to her other pocket. “And he came back in the early hours of the morning with... aha! Here it is!”

With a flourish, she pulled a folded sheet of paper from one pocket. Everyone stared at it in blank confusion, and Dave rose to the occasion.

“Uh, 'Rezi?” he asked. “What is it?”

Terezi cackled triumphantly. “This, my dear cherry coolkid, is a sketch of the prime suspect in the Ringmaster case!” She stroked the folded paper carefully with one hand and purred a little. “I thought we could go and look for him together, and bring the miscreant to justice!”

John swallowed, and Gamzee noticed that the human boy was turning unusually white. “Um... I'm not really sure,” he muttered. Dave walked over and gave him a slightly awkward reassuring pat on the back.

“It's okay, dude, we don't gotta do anything you don't want to,” he said. As John stammered out a faint thanks, the blond human turned back to Terezi. “Sorry, gray girl, but Egbert isn't too keen on clowns and shit. 'Nother time?”

The troll girl looked downcast, and her arm drooped. “Well, yeah,” she said, her voice sounding forced and fake to Gamzee's ears. “I mean, of course. John is only here for a short while, so if he doesn't want to...”

Karkat huffed impatiently. “Oh, for fuck's sake,” he said, rolling his eyes. “She came all the way here, asshat, aren't you going to look at her picture?”

Dave turned to Karkat. “Hey, is this any of your business?” he asked. “Oh, no, it isn't. So why don't you and your stoner buddy there just fuck off out of here?”

“Because,” Karkat growled through gritted teeth, “I would kind of like to recognize the fucking Ringmaster in case he ever gets it into his head to turn me into a fucking work of urban art. Any problems with that?”

There was a pause as Dave stared at him, then the boy turned to Terezi. “Okay,” he said, holding out a hand. “Let's see it.”

Terezi passed him the paper. “I licked it a little,” she told him. “But I was careful not to smudge the ink.”

“Very considerate of you,” Dave said, walking over to the kitchen counter with everyone following just behind. “Don't want to mess the pictures up when you get your freaky colored alien spit all over them, that would just be gross and disgusting.”

“Exactly,” Terezi agreed smugly, taking a step back so that John and Karkat could crowd in either side of Dave as he laid the paper down on the counter top and unfolded it. Gamzee was tall enough that he could lean in just beside his palebro, so he saw the face on the paper at the exact same moment as the rest of them.

Stupidly, the first thought in his head was: _but I'm not even wearing my face-paint no more._

John seemed similarly stunned, but Karkat and Dave were both far, far quicker on the uptake. After the first half-second of frozen silence, they dived side-by-side over the counter and landed in a heap on the kitchen floor. There was a brief moment of flailing as they wrestled, then Karkat's superior strength gave him enough of an edge to smack Dave in the face with an elbow and tug the fridge door open. The sudden motion caused a pile of shitty swords to fall out with a clatter, and both boys scrabbled for a weapon. Dave's fingers came perilously close to Karkat's hornbeds, but then ancient fighting instincts kicked in and the troll yanked his head back, simultaneously landing a solid kick into the human's stomach. As his adversary let out a heavy “oof!”, Karkat grabbed a sword, putting it across Dave's throat and kneeling over the boy's body to pin him flat on his back.

The room went still again, John shaking with fear for Dave, and Terezi's advance frozen in place by the peril to her friend. Suddenly Gamzee's voice decided to up and start working again.

“Karkat...” he said hoarsely.

“Shut up,” his moirail replied, his gaze not wavering from Dave for an instant, and Gamzee could hear all sorts of tight winding feelings in those two little words. His palebro was upset and Gamzee knew what was the most important thing right now. He had to tell him the truth.

“But, bro...” he began. This time Karkat did look around, and his face made Gamzee freeze up all inside because he was snarling, actually snarling at his own moirail.

“Shut. The fuck. Up. Gamzee,” he yelled. “Just, just, shut the fuck up! I don't want to hear it! I don't want to fucking know, you fucking _asshole_!” He was crying, red tears pouring out of his eyes and down his face.

Gamzee felt his blood-pusher lurch, and took a step forward, holding a hand out towards Karkat. For the first time in forever his own thoughts were drowning out the little dark voices, and all he could think was _no, no, fuck no, motherfucking no, no, no..._

Karkat hissed at him. “Fucking don't!” he ordered. “No! Okay? You going to fucking listen this time? You think I'm fucking stupid? That I didn't fucking _notice_?” His hand was shaking a little; the sword trembled next to Dave's throat and drew a slight line of blood. Across the room, Terezi tensed, one hand tightening around her white cane. Gamzee's head was numb with a single thought.

_Please don't let him leave me please I need him please oh motherfuck don't take my miracle away..._

“Every time,” Karkat was saying, voice growing louder and harsher by the word. “Every _fucking_ time there was a murder, you were missing, you _stupid fuck_!” He slammed his free hand into the floor for emphasis. “And I tried, I fucking tried, I literally fucking begged you not to go wandering off! FUCK!”

Gamzee flinched back, but Karkat's breathing slowed, and he closed his eyes as his head fell forwards. “Fuck,” he repeated quietly, almost gently. “I am the shittiest fucking moirail. I'm sorry, I'm so fucking sorry. I should have stopped you. I'm so fucking sorry...”

Relief hit Gamzee like a breaking wave, washing away everything that wasn't just pure pale pity for the little mutant troll who was still blaming himself for something that wasn't his fault and never could have been. Nothing in the universe could have stopped him from rushing to Karkat's side and gathering him into the tightest and most righteous hug a brother ever gave his moirail.

Nothing but the prick of sharp cold steel sliding across the front of his throat, that is. Gamzee's eyes flicked down to see a fingerless black glove around the grip of the not actually very shitty sword, felt the height and weight of the human behind him, and found himself not at all surprised that this man had managed to get the drop on a distraught, distracted troll kid.

“Hey, you,” Bro said. “Get the fuck off my kid brother, right now.”

Karkat's head swung back up and he stared vacantly at the pair of them for a second before the image really sunk in and his face filled with horror. Dave took advantage of the situation to wriggle his arms free and knock the blade away from his neck, following up by wrestling Karkat to the ground and sitting on him. The troll didn't offer any resistance, his furious gaze locked on Gamzee's peril. He barely even made a sound, even when Dave “accidentally” elbowed him in the stomach as revenge for earlier injuries. Gamzee hissed at the human, wanting to tear him open for that little cruelty, and the sword pressed a little closer against his neck.

“'Rezi, cops,” Bro said, and Terezi grinned viciously as she pulled out her cellphone and started dialing. “John, sit down before you fall the fuck over.”

John obeyed Bro too, slumping into the couch and pulling his legs up to hug them close. He was breathing pretty shakily, but Gamzee only cared about Karkat, who was silently crying and hurting and might as well be a thousand miles away for all the comfort Gamzee could give him right now. Bro dragged him away from his moirail, and kept Gamzee at the edge of his sword while on the other side of the room Dave held Karkat down. Before Terezi had finished her call John had recovered enough to be sent into Bro's room to fetch a pair of handcuffs, and he helped Bro fasten Gamzee to the centralized heat dispersion unit. Little motherfucker really was strong, too- Gamzee wasn't all up and sure he could have wrestled free, even it wasn't for Bro watching with his sword ready. Once Gamzee was secured, Karkat was dragged over to the couch to wait at the tip of Terezi's cane until the police arrived. For the entire wait, Gamzee was unable to hear anything but his quiet little voices howling with laughter and telling him mockingly that this whole thing was entirely his own motherfucking fault. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn't find a reason to disagree with them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Have this chapter a day early! Hooray!


	16. ==> Be The Bipolar Psionic Hacker

### CHAPTER FIFTEEN ==> Be The Bipolar Psionic Hacker

Sollux Captor knew he should be sleeping. Not that it was strange for him to stay up for days at a time; in his manic phases, he usually needed Feferi to drag him away from his computer, or failing that one of the Lalonde women was usually prepared to drug him into a stupor and guide him to bed. Right now, however, he wasn't in the least bit manic, and he was exhausted. It was just hard to sleep with a crowd of angry protestors chanting outside the front gate.

“Maybe you're better off being comatothe,” he told Aradia sadly, stroking his thumb across the back of her hand. He thought maybe her eyelids might have fluttered slightly. Yeah, right. Aradia hadn't so much as twitched in- what? Three sweeps? Six and a half years?

Almost half their lives. It wasn't fair, even if you didn't count the sweep and a half- three and one quarter years- aboard the ship. Sollux tried not to think about it, but sometimes he still woke in a panic from dreams where he was trying to balance time and space, where he had to keep pushing and pushing some impossible weight forwards or else something terrible and dark behind him would catch up. He could handle the dreams, though. Not knowing whether Aradia was dreaming at all was much harder.

“Thorry,” he said to the girl, the only sign of life the peaceful rise and fall of her chest beneath the sheets. He didn't bother to say the rest- sorry that we didn't have more time, sorry that I couldn't find a world that could heal you, sorry that I hurt you at all. He'd said it before and if she could hear him, she already knew. It occurred to him that he was probably being melancholy, but fuck it. He'd just had to watch Feferi's dreams get shattered, along with any hope for the future of his race on this world. The world he had marooned them on, because he was the shittiest Helmsman imaginable.

Okay, now he was agreeing with that fishfaced fuck Eridan. Definitely on the downswing. He sighed and bent to rest his head on the edge of the bed, playing gently with his and Aradia's intertwined fingers. He could hear a lot of noise and commotion coming from downstairs; probably something to do with the protestors outside, fuck them all very much. Sollux decided to stay upstairs out of the way, since he would probably only upset everyone if he went down to join them anyway.

His self-imposed isolation came to an abrupt end when the door crashed open and Roxy came stumbling in. Sollux refused to call her Mom, or Doctor Lalonde, or any other stupid human titular construct for that matter. She in turn seemed to refuse to stop doting on him in the most impossibly infuriating way. He didn't quite buy into Rose's theory that she was doing it to annoy on purpose, being more inclined to blame inebriation and downright stupidity. But for every overpriced piece of shit hard-drive she gifted him that he had to pull apart and reassemble before it approached even remotely useful, there was the tireless patient care for Aradia and the painstaking work to try and help his species survive on her world. Remembering that, Sollux chose not to eject the woman telekinetically, instead electing to glare angrily at her from behind bicolored shades.

Roxy predictably ignored his annoyance and slumped down into a chair across the room, leaning her head back against the wall as she clutched her martini glass like a lifeline. She was normally a little tipsy in the evenings, but for the past couple of days she had really been hitting the bottle. Sollux would have worried about her, but he had other problems and she was an adult, for fuck's sake. She would just have to take care of herself.

“I have just had a call from the nice dec... def... detecytives from the other night,” Roxy managed, concentrating hard on the words spilling from her mouth. “They arris... ayres... fuck it, caught... your friend Karkit.” She blinked lopsidedly and reeled, but Sollux was there to psionically catch her glass and tilt it upright before disaster struck, red and blue energy crackling in the air as he glowered at her from across the room.

“Mind the fucking wireth!” he yelled, immediate concerns taking priority. “In fact, get the hell out of here until you're thober! What the fuck ith wrong with you?” He dropped Aradia's hand and scrambled around the bed to grab Roxy's arm and start manually hustling her out the door. He wasn't exactly physically intimidating but then she wasn't a paragon of coordination and control, and he had soon guided his supposed caretaker into the corridor and was shutting the door behind both of them just as Kanaya reached the top of the stairs.

“Ah, there she is,” the jade-blood said, relieved. “I'm sorry if she has been bothering you, Sollux. I think she is having a bad day; I am trying to watch her for Rose's sake.”

Sollux scowled. “Keep her out of my way,” he said, crossly. “I have thome thingth to do in my room.”

Roxy winked at Kanaya, grinning broadly. “He thinks I don't know that usually when he says that it means he's gonna get all cil... all caly... all carlijybutt? Calagginus? Whatever. Get his hate-mack on with the fishy boy.” She hiccuped. “Pretty fishy, lols.”

Sollux face-palmed. Kanaya made an awkward click with her tongue and gently took Roxy's hand.

“I think you should probably take a short nap in the master bedroom,” she said firmly. “And you should definitely sober up before you go near anyone else who hasn't worked out what, in retrospect, should have been perfectly obvious.”

“Fuck you too,” Sollux hissed as she walked past him. Kanaya favored him with a very sharp and pointed smile.

“Now, Sollux,” she said in the same inarguable tone, “Since Eridan is on the other side of the city, I suspect you really did have some things to do. Either that or you are simply making excuses to avoid us all. Either way I could care less.” She paused and glanced down the stairs. “The last thing we need right now is another emotionally volatile element.”

Sollux was about to snap back an angry retort when he realized she was right about one thing at least- he did have something important to do. Restricting his response to a single raised digit at her retreating back, he ducked sideways into his room and settled in behind the soft glow of his twin monitors. The left one had a background of the blue Earth ocean, the one on the right a tight spiral of red circuit diagrams. The combined light looked purple against his skin as he rapidly tapped on the keyboard, ignoring a half-finished coding project that had been waiting for him to get back to it since last night. What it did was utterly unimportant because it didn't help him right now.

The LAPD public website was typical shitty government design, all flashy banners and thumbnails and big titles to grab the attention of the technologically retarded. Sollux noticed a warning note and plea for information on the Ringmaster, right beside a banner asking for new recruits. Further down there were a lot of gray faces in with the wanted gang members, although the most wanted list seemed predominantly human. Sollux didn't give a shit who any of them were and instead started digging through the layers of the website, tracking back through the servers until he found a backdoor into the actual precinct's systems. With his setup on Alternia he could have done it in less than a minute; using stupid crappy Earth hardware, it took more like five. It wasn't until he was searching for security camera feeds that he remembered the station might keep video on a totally separate system. For three-fifths of a second he panicked, before he found the right directory and suddenly he was looking at a quiet reception area from above. He could see Rose leaning against a desk, Eridan pacing, and what looked like Jade's leg in the edge of the shot.

Sollux offered up a silent prayer to thank any entity responsible for modernization in government.

Fingers flickered across the keyboard as he dug out the feeds he was actually interested in; both monitors glowed as twin images of interview rooms filled them, identical squares of glaring white, with identical cheap tables in the center and identical plastic chairs. The screen on the right showed a tall, thin, long-horned troll that Sollux didn't recognize. The screen on the left showed him Karkat.

Sollux could feel a lump building in his throat as he looked at the computerized image. Even blurred and tiny and indistinct, even after almost four years of no contact, he knew it was his friend. Everything from the tiny nubby horns to the way he was slumped in a chair, every line of his body screaming annoyance, was Karkat through and through. Sollux reached out and ran a finger down the screen.

“Hi, KK,” he whispered. The small figure on the left didn't move at all, but the unfamiliar troll on the right sat up and looked around. For a crazy moment Sollux thought the stranger had heard him, but then two detectives walked into the image and he realized that the kid had been responding to them. The one he seemed to recall as Sikes leaned casually against the wall, while the other- Francisco, that was it- sat down opposite the tall troll and put a pair of manilla folders on the table between them. A third, unfamiliar human man walked into the shot and walked over to stick a hand out to the dazed-looking kid.

“Hello, Gamzee,” the third man said. He looked worn out, Sollux thought, all washed out gray and nondescript brown. “I'm Tom Rawlings, your attorney.” After receiving a lengthy blank stare, the human dropped his hand and grabbed a chair instead. “That means I'm here to protect your interests,” he told Gamzee.

“Why?” the troll asked, sounding genuinely confused. Sollux noticed that his clothes- and Karkat's, too, now he looked- were motley and frayed and probably dirty too, although that was harder to see over the shitty human cameras. Fuck, how long had they been homeless? Sollux felt a bit sick that he hadn't bothered to look any harder for his supposed best friend. Karkat could have come and lived with him- it wasn't like Roxy didn't have the money and they could have found room somewhere. He would even have shared his own respite block, even if Karkat could practically break computers by looking at them.

The cops and the lawyer seemed used to Alternians not understanding due process, because they took Gamzee's confusion in their stride. “It's your right to have legal representation,” Detective Francisco told him. “Since you're still a minor and you don't have a legal guardian, if we interviewed you without your lawyer present everything we learned could get thrown out of court.”

Gamzee looked even more puzzled, if anything. “But I thought you motherfuckers were all going to up and cull me?” he said, looking between the three men. The clicking burr of his accent was so heavy that Sollux wondered whether he could even understand all the English words being used around him.

“That's not how the legal system works in America,” Rawlings said gently. Sollux thought that as a public defender he was probably used to explaining this to trolls who had somehow missed the memo. “We do have the death penalty, and for the crimes you're accused of the DA may even try and push for it, but you can't be punished for anything unless you're found guilty in a court of law.”

“And then you're all gonna up and cull me?”

The lawyer sighed. “Gamzee, you are a minor with a documented mental health problem. If it comes to it an insanity plea would almost certainly be accepted, in which case you would be sent to a secure unit. Not culled.” He glared at the cops. “Of course, it isn't going to come to that, because there is no solid evidence against you at all.”

“We've got an eyewitness that places him at the scene,” Detective Sikes pointed out.

“But...” Gamzee began, getting no further before Rawlings interrupted him.

“As your lawyer, I'm recommending that you say nothing,” he said to the startled troll. “Let me do the talking.” He turned back to the two detectives. “I read the report. You have a frightened child who thinks it might be him. Hardly the basis for a multiple homicide case.”

“Which is why we aren't currently holding him on the Ringmaster killings,” Detective Francisco said, tapping the top manilla folder. “Fortunately there was an existing warrant for him and his moirail.”

“Yes, I saw,” Rawlings said, picking the folder up and flicking through the papers. “Their foster father. You and your partner investigated that case too, didn't you?”

“This isn't some vendetta,” Detective Sikes said, arms folded. “We got fingerprints when we arrested them and when forensics is done matching them we won't need any more evidence. That case is open and shut.”

“Then I don't see how we have anything else to discuss,” Rawlings said. “I can build a solid self-defense case from what's in here alone.” He snorted with amusement. “In fact, it's almost as if someone wrote the report that way on purpose.”

“Really? I can't possibly imagine why,” Detective Francisco said mildly. “But the fact remains that Gamzee has no alibi for the Ringmaster killings, and an undeniable history of similar violence. We have his moirail in the other room and he seems fairly convinced of Gamzee's guilt...”

“No!”

The three humans looked over at the troll. Sollux wondered if they could recognize the panic in the way his claws were digging into the table and his lips pulled back from his teeth. Human and Alternian body language was generally close enough to avoid confusion, but when emotions ran high things could get hazy.

“I didn't do it,” Gamzee said. Fuck, were those purple tears? Sollux hadn't quite believed until that moment that Karkat had managed to snag an indigo-blood in his pale quadrant. Maybe as a kismesis, but the idea of his high-strung friend in a conciliatory role with such a notoriously unstable rung on the hemospectrum had been ridiculous. The highblooded troll leaned over across the table, eyes wide. “It wasn't this motherfucker, I fucking swear, you gotta tell Karbro I didn't motherfucking cull nobody, please!”

“Gamzee,” Rawlings said, laying a hand on the troll's shoulder to try and pull him back. Gamzee whirled around and snapped at the unwanted intrusion, and the lawyer pulled his arm back from those sharp fangs with impressive speed.

“I didn't motherfucking cull nobody!” he screamed. “Them little motherfuckers are always making their chucklevoodoo in my thinkpan and telling me to be all up and painting the HARSHWHIMSY and the RIGHTEOUS MIRTH but I MOTHERFUCKING DON'T because I DON'T WANT TO!” He suddenly slumped, head thumping onto the table like a puppet with cut strings. “I don't motherfucking want to,” he whimpered. “And Karbro knows that and he does everything to keep me chill, motherfucking everything. Don't let him be all up and thinking he failed, 'cause he never did. He's the motherfucking miracle, you dig me? The motherfucking bitchtits mother of all motherfucking miracles. Made this motherfucker stop from getting his murder on.” He rolled his face over into the circle of his arms. “Want some motherfucking sopor,” he muttered.

It was pretty damn pitiful, Sollux realized. Not exactly what did it for him- in fact he kind of wanted to punch the asshole for dragging Karkat into his fucked up life- but he could see how someone might be drawn to the train wreck that was Gamzee Makara. Especially a romantic idiot like Karkat. At least this fuckass seemed to be aware of how special his pale quadrant really was. It occurred to Sollux that he might be harboring a few red feelings for his old friend himself, but he shrugged them off. However pitiful he was in theory, Karkat was too much of an asshole for him to deal with in a quadrant, and he knew it. Besides, he had Aradia to think of. And Feferi too, of course.

“... get his prescription sent over,” Rawlings was saying when Sollux turned his attention back to the screen. “He's clearly in no state to talk to anyone- he as good as said he's experiencing auditory hallucinations!”

Detective Sikes looked as though he wanted to object, but Detective Francisco nodded. “Of course,” he said. “We can resume this interview later, when he's feeling better.” He looked over at Gamzee, who hadn't moved from his slumped position. “I'll call a uniform to take him back to the holding cell.”

“I'll stay with him,” Rawlings said firmly, and the two cops didn't argue as they gathered the folders of evidence and left the room. Sollux saw Rawlings lean onto the table beside Gamzee before he turned his gaze to the other screen. To his surprise, a second person was now in the room sitting next to Karkat, a human woman with dark hair and a hawkish cast to her features. She looked over as the door swung open to admit the two detectives. Karkat didn't stir, continuing to look fixedly at the opposite corner of the room.

This time both men took seats on the opposite side of the table, although Detective Sikes did turn his around and lean on the backrest. His partner placed the same two folders on the table between them and smiled.

“It's nice to see you again, Ms Medina. Hello, Karkat,” he said. The pickup in this room was less clear and Sollux scrambled to turn the sound up a little on his computer. He managed it just in time to catch his old friend's reply.

“FUCK OFF.”

On second thought, maybe the sound needed to be slightly quieter? He had forgotten quite how loud Karkat could be. His voice had gotten deeper with age, although not as much as Sollux had thought it might, and speaking English it carried a thick Alternian accent that made him sound utterly savage- not that he had ever sounded gentle anyway.

“Real little charmer, aren't you?” Detective Sikes was saying. Karkat gave him the finger. Francisco ignored them both and opened the top folder, carefully placing a row of papers that Sollux couldn't quite make out on the table. Karkat barely glanced at them before his head snapped around to face the far corner of the room again. His arms wrapped around himself defensively, but he stayed silent. That wasn't right. Sollux couldn't remember Karkat ever being speechless.

“You know, these make for some interesting reading,” Detective Francisco said, conversationally. “Let's see...” he reached out and pulled one of the papers towards himself. “This would be yours and Gamzee's initial assessment reports. Apparently he was diagnosed as having a dissociative disorder? And you are listed as his carer, although from the date on this I suspect it's an early moirallegiance classification that was adapted later in Quarantine.”

Karkat shifted nervously in his seat and Sollux noticed that he looked thin. Not that he himself was at any risk of being overweight, but Karkat had always had a shorter, stockier build. No, he was missing more than a bit of baby fat. He looked as if someone had hollowed him out and left barely enough behind to stand upright. He looked tired and translucent, and although he was still defiant Sollux had known him well enough to see that it was a fragile ghost of his old demeanor.

“Is there a point to this?” Medina asked, tapping a finger impatiently on the table. “Because it will be rather hard to defend my client if you don't actually get around to accusing him of anything.”

Detective Francisco smiled at her and pushed forward another sheaf of papers. “Just trying to get a little conversation going, Ms Medina. Karkat, this is the paperwork from your social worker. Do you remember her? She got you into a foster home...”

“You know what? I agree with this drooling moron here. Is there a fucking point to this?” Karkat slammed a hand down on the table and leaned forward out of his seat, growling. “Because if all you terts want to do is repeat my life story back at me, you can save yourselves the effort. I was there, I know it, you know it, show is fucking over. Or is this some sort of human legislacerator torture? You chatter inanely at me until I confess to everything just to stop my thinkpan from dribbling out of my every orifice with the tedium?” He glared at the cops in front of him, then jumped back as Detective Sikes also stood up and leaned on the table with his knuckles, bringing himself eye to eye with the young troll.

“Fine,” he said, his face entirely without humor. “Let's talk about what we don't know.” He reached out and pushed forwards one of the sheaves of paper, this one topped with a photograph Sollux couldn't make out. “Let's talk about how your foster father was found face-down on his kitchen floor in critical condition. You want to tell us what happened there? Or is that too boring for you?”

“Karkat, I'm advising you not to say anything...” Medina began. Karkat rounded on her.

“Did I or did I not tell you to shut the fuck up?” he yelled. “I am not some pathetic human wiggler who needs his hand held to use the load gaper! I am not so fucking retarded as to spill my fleshy digestive organs to the first sorry excuse for an terrorgationist who asks!” He hissed at the woman. “Now keep your seedflap buttoned before I take exception to your next fantastic fucking plan.” He slumped back in his chair grumpily. “Can you believe she suggested I should feed my moirail to Gl'bgolyb to save my own ass? Fucking moronic.”

Detective Francisco winced. “Karkat,” he said softly, almost kindly. “Detective Sikes and I were at this crime scene. We searched that house.” He paused as his partner settled back onto a chair. “There were a lot of empty bottles,” he said. “And not much else. Forensics says the toaster was the weapon, which screams of an opportunistic attack. The neighbors reported regular disturbances from the property. People arguing, shouting, things breaking.”

“So fucking what?” Karkat spat, shifting to curl up a little tighter in the chair. “What do you want, a medal for figuring it out? Are you waiting for a tearful confession? Or should I say I'm glad I hit him and I hope he fucking died like the vile rotting bulgescum he was?”

His lawyer started saying something then, but Sollux didn't hear it through the crackle of his own psionics. Red and blue light flickered as he ground his teeth, blood boiling with rage. Feferi had dragged him downstairs to watch enough awful human drama shows with her that he could put two and two together, and if the asshole they were talking about wasn't dead already Sollux was going to see to it that he was soon.

His fingers flew across the keyboard without him even having to think about it, dragging up police and social services records. Gamzee's lawyer hadn't been kidding about the report Francisco had submitted- it did everything short of outright saying the victim was an abusive asshole, and there was almost a note of satisfaction in the paragraph detailing how he was unlikely to ever wake up from his coma. Still, Sollux had to be sure; he followed the medical records, reading them easily from long experience with Aradia's condition.

A little too easily, in fact, because after the first few weeks the handwriting on the scanned forms became remarkably familiar. Sollux skipped several months of routine checks and went straight for the transfer forms. As he had suspected, the code at the top of the sheet was one he had seen before. He flicked through the most recent updates and felt his anger fading. Or perhaps it was less that he was growing calmer and more that he was passing through the eye of the storm, because as he read he felt his ire rising again- this time with a different, closer target.

Sollux jumped to his feet and raced away from his computer, ignoring the stairs in favor of using his psionics to fly to the lower floor. The tendrils of energy flicked and juddered furiously under his control, lashing out in angry whip-tails and snapping back with electric cracks.

 _“LALONDE!”_ he howled. A blue line of light slipped away from him and shattered a vase as the rest of the occupants of the house came running, halting uncertainly in doorways at the sight of Sollux glowing and hovering above the ground. _“GET THE FUCK OUT HERE RIGHT NOW, YOU INTOTHICATED BITTTH!”_

Kanaya was pushed to one side as Roxy stumbled out past her and smiled at Sollux. “Hi!” she said, raising her glass in a toast. Sollux growled and the glass glowed red for a second before shattering in her hand. Crystal fragments rained on the carpet and the woman groaned in pain at the red lines starting to bleed on her hand. Sollux felt a pang of guilt and crushed it under raw fury.

“WHEN WERE YOU GOING TO TELL ME!?” he screamed. “WHEN?!”

Roxy tilted her head to look up at him, eyes far too sharp for someone who should be passed out drunk. “Tell you whas... whatsh?” she asked. “I told you 'bout your friend, didn't I?”

Sollux clenched his fists and a few wizard figurines exploded. Kanaya and Feferi ducked reflexively. “YOU DIDN'T TELL ME ABOUT AA!” he yelled.

“Now, young man,” Harley said, raising his hand in a placating gesture as he stepped forward. “I think that perhaps you should calm down...”

 _“I AM PERFECTLY FUCKING CALM!!”_ Sollux screamed, exploding the front out of a display cabinet and causing the TV to make a loud crack and emit a puff of smoke. _“DON'T FUCKING TELL ME TO CALM DOWN!!”_

“It's okay,” Roxy said, gently reaching out to lower Harley's arm. “I think I know what this is abutt... aout... fuck it.” She fixed her gaze sharply on Sollux. “You found the tesht subject results.”

Sollux said nothing, but the incandescent crackling of his psionics spoke for him. Roxy smiled and took a clumsy step closer.

“'S okay,” she said. “I get you're mad. But I wash... I wasn't hiding anythink from you. I jus' wanted to be sore... sure before I told you.”

Sollux's lights began to die down and he sunk a little closer to the ground. Roxy moved another step.

“Very deli... dela... delicate matter,” she said. “Jusht 'cause it worked onna human doesn't mean it will for her.”

Sollux's toes touched the carpet and Roxy was right in front of him now. It was easy to forget how kind she was sometimes, until he was faced with her like this, face shining with concern even though her hand was bleeding because of something he had done.

“I didn't wanna make you hop... hopeful without a sure thing,” she slurred. “It's been so long...”

She reached out and caught Sollux as he slumped forwards, crackling lights dying as his eyes closed. He let her hold him for a few minutes, even though she was bony and smelled like an open bar, and he hoped that she wasn't too badly hurt.

“I want her to have the treatment,” he said into Roxy's shoulder. “If it doethn't work... she'th been waiting long enough.”

“You both have,” Roxy agreed gently. “I'll see to it as soon as I can.”

There was another pair of arms wrapping around Sollux, and he looked over to see Fef's smiling face right next to his own.

“Are you alright?” she asked. Sollux leaned into her and Roxy let him go, stepping back.

“Yeth,” he said.

“Shore?” Fef asked him and he grinned.

“Yeth,” he repeated. He really was. Despite how it had happened, he had proof that Karkat was alive and hope that Aradia would wake up soon. That was more than he'd had for the last two years. Longer.

Wait, shit, Karkat.

He was racing back up the stairs before he could quite register what he was thinking, Feferi on his heels as he charged into his room and swung back into position before the monitors. He heard her gasp as she came in.

“Sollux, did you hack into the carp station's cameras?”

“Shh,” he whispered, flapping his hand at her and trying to work out what was going on in the interview room. The papers from both folders were a little more spread out and Karkat seemed more subdued, although his lawyer seemed even more harried. The cops seemed to be winning; Sollux wondered if that was a good thing or a bad one.

“... like you were trying to get caught,” Detective Sikes was saying. “Why else would you look at the sketch if you thought it was Gamzee?”

“I was not trying to get caught,” Karkat snarled. “Fuck off and die.”

“It's okay,” Detective Francisco told him. “If you're scared of him or you thought he needed more help...”

“Fuck you!” Karkat yelled. “You terts think I can't take care of my own moirail?”

The detective gave him a look of gentle understanding. “It's nothing to be ashamed of, Karkat. You've been in an extremely difficult position for a very long time. It's not your fault if you couldn't cope.”

“Is that your friend?” Feferi asked, leaning over Sollux's shoulder.

“Thut up, FF!”

She glubbed sadly as Sollux shoved her back. “I just thought he looked eely lonely, is all.”

Sollux gave her a hesitant nod before turning back to the screen. Karkat was curled in on himself again, and Sollux thought he could see some red tear-tracks on his friend's face. Fuck, he was looking pretty pitiful right now. No, that was not what he needed to be thinking about at the moment, not with Feferi right behind him!

“Karkat?” Detective Francisco prompted gently. The troll in front of him refused to meet his eyes.

“... I didn't want it to be him,” he said quietly, so much so that Sollux wasn't sure it was even Karkat speaking at first. “I was so fucking scared that if I looked it would be and then I thought that if it was it would serve him right. I fucking did everything to try and stop him and he wouldn't fucking listen, the stupid clown-faced assmunch.” He sniffed and rubbed his face with a grubby sleeve. “I am the worst fucking moirail in the history of the universe,” he announced. “Do I stop with utterly failing to stop my pale quadrant from running off on several separate murdervoodoo rampages through the streets of the city, painting the walls like some sort of demented harlequin rainbow drinker graffiti artist? No, of course not, because then I might qualify as some sort of normal failure, or at least a pathetic excuse for a waste of breath. I have to go and fucking sell his ass to the the culling squads because I'm such a fucking piece of shit. Fuck, I didn't even have the basic indecent grasping intelligence to sell him out properly, did I? No, I did it for free because I am a stupid fucking morally bankrupt idiot piece of shit that all the other pieces of shit in the sewer look down on and I betrayed my moirail who actually fucking pities me in a fit of passive-aggressive asshole rage. Fuck, fuck, FUCK! DON'T TOUCH ME!”

The last part was directed at Medina, who had tried to put an arm around his shoulders in a very human gesture of comfort. She pulled it back quickly and the three humans were left watching uncomfortably as Karkat pulled himself into a tight ball on his chair and buried his sobbing in his arms. Aware that he was spying on something Karkat would probably murder him for seeing, Sollux reached over and turned the speakers and screen off, leaving his bedroom in a sudden deep silence as he avoided Feferi's gaze.

“I want him out of there,” Sollux said. Feferi put a gentle hand on his shoulder.

“It's not your fault,” she told him, spinning the computer chair and bending down so she could lean her forehead against his. “You didn't know.”

“I thould have athked,” Sollux muttered, and fuck it he was crying too now. “He wath my betht friend, Fef, I thould have looked harder for him! Fuck, I'm the one who told him about the thip in the firtht plathe! None of thith would have happened if it wathn't for me!”

Feferi glubbed and rubbed a hand down his arm. “Then you should be proud of yourshell.”

“How can you thay that?” Sollux demanded. “Didn't you thee that? I ruined hith life!”

“I saw it fin,” Feferi told him. “I could sea that your friend's blood is bright red. He would have died on Alternia, in a few years from now if not already.” She turned her head up to kiss Sollux on the forehead. “I'm proud of you. You saved his life once already and I know you clam do it again.” Rocking back on her heels, she pulled a phone out of her pocket. “We can post bail for him, right?”

Sollux blinked. “Yeth, but...” He waved a hand towards the front of the house, still besieged by protestors. “Where'th he going to go?”

Feferi smiled brightly and tousled his hair. “Don't worry,” she said chirpily. “I have some ideas!”

Sollux leaned back as Feferi started making calls and realized that his bones were buzzing. He was still tired from being up all night, still emotionally drained from everything that had happened, but he couldn't just sit and do nothing.

Part of him pointed out that this was pretty classic for the start of a manic phase and that he should probably get some rest or at least eat something, but there was no way he could just calmly shrug it all off and relax now. It occurred to him that even if they managed to bail Karkat and get him a decent lawyer for the charges regarding his foster father, there was still going to be some serious unfinished business relating to the Ringmaster and his moirail. The cops hadn't found anything, but Sollux had a few ideas, and he had avenues of investigation that these technologically retarded monkey people hadn't even dreamed of.

He could feel a sharp grin splitting his face as he turned the monitor back on and got to work.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This technologically retarded monkey person still has no idea how the US legal system works, and adds to this ignorance a lack of understanding of computers! Yay!


	17. ==> Be The Doubtful Blind Investigator

### CHAPTER SIXTEEN ==> Be The Doubtful Blind Investigator

Terezi Pyrope smelled a rat, which was her favorite English idiom right after “kicking the bucket” as a euphemism for dying. She had laughed for five minutes straight after Dave told her that one. Since there were no large deceased squeakbeasts in the near vicinity, however, it would be more literally accurate to say that Terezi Pyrope smelled something amiss. Specifically, Gamzee's reaction to his arrest.

It was late evening, and she was sat curled up on her sleeping bag on Matt's sofa. The movie night at Tav's had been put on hold until a day when John and Dave were not utterly frazzled from giving statements to the police. Terezi didn't really see what their problem was- it had been exciting to be involved in a real arrest! But her favorite cherry-colored friend had insisted, saying that he and John would probably just spend what was left of the day chilling and playing video games. This had left Terezi in the position of having to ask Matt if she could sleep on his sofa for another night. Well, not ask so much as just stay put and rely on his soft human parental instinct to not throw her out. She wanted to give Cathy a few more days of space before she went back to her. At least her mother had heard the story from Matt and Terezi, and not the news: Terezi hadn't needed to be able to see to listen to the recording that was the top story on every station, and she still had the program on in the background so she could keep one ear on the developments around Derse Mansion. She had the uncomfortable feeling that her future was entirely in someone else's hands, and she didn't like it one bit.

To distract herself, she tried to focus on what had been wrong about Gamzee's smell. He had been a miasma of feelings as he was led past her out the door; scared, which was normal, and confused, which was probably normal considering the musty stench of stale sopor that followed in his wake. There had been guilt, too, a subtle scent but one that Terezi recognized as clearly as she did deceit...

Oh. That was it. The supposed murderer, who had allegedly been concealing his actions from his own moirail, had barely smelt of lies at all. Terezi tapped her fingers thoughtfully on the back of the couch as she leaned back. It was simply impossible to reconcile, which meant she was missing something. As she tried to work out the possibilities, she heard the key turn in the lock and the door open. About to greet Matt with a customary taunt, she paused when a second blur of smells followed him in. Immediately she began to categorize the unexpected visitor. Alternian, male, afraid, guilty, uncertain, and under it all an omnipresent tang of sweet, delicious cherry red.

“Karkat!” She screeched the unfamiliar name in delight, launching herself off the couch to attach herself to the other troll's arm. He yelled and tried to push her off; undeterred, she licked a long strip up the side of his face. The flavors exploded on her tongue: he tasted different to Dave, his red dustier and deeper and slightly bruised, like cherries rescued from the base of the tree compared to cheap chemical cherry soda from the Seven Eleven. It was a delicious difference and she licked him again before she let Matt tug her away.

“'Rezi, what the hell are you doing?” he demanded. She grinned unseeing at where his face ought to be, meeting the cool vanilla spots of his human eyes.

“He tastes good,” she said. Karkat shuddered and his miasma retreated a step backward towards the door.

“Hold it right there, kid,” Matt said, head whipping around in a rush of air. “You run for it and I will shoot you in the leg, got it?”

“I stay here and your freak-show of a kid is going to fucking eat me!” Karkat protested. He was so easy to find when he talked, constantly moving so that the air around him never had a chance to still. “Or I am going to cull her insane cannibal ass before I become the main fucking course. Either way it's going to be fucking mess.”

“She is not going to eat you,” Matt said crossly. “And she isn't my kid, she's my neighbor's. 'Rezi, what are you doing here still?”

Terezi walked over to settle back onto the sofa and grinned. “Movie night got canceled,” she told him, using the facts to obscure the truth. “And Cathy isn't expecting me back until tomorrow.” She sniffed the air and got a good lungful of the pair of them. It was delectable. “I can see this is going to be more fun than I thought,” she added.

“Fuck, no,” Karkat said. “No. If she's here, I want to go back. Put me in a cell, please. I don't mind sharing; I would in fact rather share with the biggest, ugliest, most foul-tempered grubfucking shitsponge you have locked away in there than spend any time at all with her. At least if he licked me you terts wouldn't wait to pull him off!”

“Sorry, kid,” Matt said, and Terezi smelled deceit on him because he didn't sound even slightly sorry at all. “You're out on bail now and you're staying here. You and 'Rezi are just gonna have to play nice for a few days.”

“Fucking great,” he muttered, and Terezi heard him stomp across the room and fling himself into the furthest corner from the couch, where her mental map of the room told her he would be half-hidden behind the TV. Matt sighed.

“I'll go dig out some clothes for you,” he said in the direction of Karkat. “They'll probably be a bit big, but they'll be cleaner than what you're wearing.”

There was no reply from the troll boy, which Matt seemed to take as assent because his blur of smells trailed past and vanished into the bedroom. Terezi waited until she heard the door click shut before scrambling across the room and pushing herself into Karkat's corner. He shrunk back, flattening himself against the wall as he tried to avoid her, but this time she didn't lick him at all. No matter that he smelled mouthwatering: she had more pressing concerns.

“Do you think your moirail is guilty?” she asked, stern as befitted the seriousness of the matter. His eyes went wide; she could smell their citrus goodness grow under her nose.

“... what?”

“Your moirail,” she repeated. “Do you think he's the Ringmaster?”

He hissed and shoved, and suddenly she was sprawling out on her back with him leaning over her, rough fingers pinning her arms to the floor. “I know what kind of fucking mess he makes!” he whispered, switching to Alternian. He sounded like he wanted to be shouting, but Terezi guessed he didn't want Matt to hear him. “I have done since we became moirails. I have no idea where he was when those people died, but he fucking lied to me about it! He was even in the fucking sketch! Of course I think he's guilty!”

Terezi flexed her shoulders and levered her upper body off the ground. He was surprisingly strong to keep a teal-blood pinned, far stronger than a rustblood would be. She wondered where in the hemospectrum he would be without his mutation. Not a psychic, not monstrously strong but hardly weak either; midblooded like her, most likely. She pushed her face up until it was right next to his ear.

“I don't,” she whispered in her native language, and he shot back into the corner, pulling back from her control and confidence as she had suspected he would. She sniffed for his shape and found him crouching, watching her like a feral meowbeast unsure of whether to aggress or abscond. He smelled more than just afraid and she felt a pang of guilt; he had been so proud and so fierce that she had missed the underlying panic, and she had definitely pushed him further than she intended. Slowly she moved back and settled down sitting slightly out of arm's reach, a rare gesture of conciliation.

“I'm sorry,” she said. “I'm not going to hurt you.” She grinned. “Matt wouldn't be very happy about it if I did.”

There was a pause, and then he spoke again. “Why the fuck not?” He sounded like he was testing the waters, but his scent told a different story. He really didn't understand. Terezi could have kicked herself; of course he didn't understand, he hadn't been adopted by a Cathy or a George, hadn't had a Dave to hang out with. He'd never had a chance to learn, really learn, what made this world so different from the one they had fled, and as brilliant as Matt was he would never have explained it either because humans never realized what they needed to say. Terezi decided she would help them all out by schoolfeeding Karkat the basics.

“That's not how humans think,” she told him. He snorted derisively.

“Hoofbeast shit,” he said. “Humans hurt people. They do it all the fucking time, I've seen it.”

“Yeah,” Terezi agreed. “They do. But they're not supposed to.”

Another pause. “What the fuck is that supposed to mean?” he snapped. He was still talking in Alternian, which just confirmed her suspicion that he hadn't spent much time with humans. “They aren't supposed to? What, did their creator manifest one day and tell them, oh, by the way, I know I made you all raging fuckasses who can barely suppress your desire to exploit and murder each other at every fleeting opportunity, but don't fucking do that crap or I'll start smiting you all like the useless little shits you are? That is the most grubfucking retarded thing I have ever heard, and my moirail is an officially insane clown worshiping drug addict!”

Terezi cackled a little. “Actually, I'm pretty sure some humans do think that,” she said. “But even the ones who don't can agree that they should take care of other people, even when they're actually doing the opposite.”

She could smell the surprise pouring off Karkat, buried under layers of skepticism and suspicion. “That... that makes no grubdamned sense,” he said, air shifting as he shook his head. “No. Because Alternia was fucked up, but it made sense. If you tell everyone that they have to be a selfish murdering asshole and that's a good thing to be, then of course you're going to end up surrounded by selfish murdering assholes. But how the fuck do you tell people that they should be helpful and friendly and save little fucking baby hopbeasts and have them all agree and end up with a planet full of dangerous sadistic fuckwads _anyway_?”

Terezi shrugged. “I don't know, and I'm not really sure they do either. All I know is that on this world, in this country, if someone does something that harms you, they are in the wrong and the law will punish them.” She waved a hand towards the bedroom. “Matt is a police detective. He upholds the law, so he can't hurt you.”

“Oh yeah?” Karkat asked. “And who makes sure of that?” He smelled far less afraid than he had, and more defiant. Terezi grinned triumphantly.

“Internal Affairs!” she declared. “They are the watchers who watch the watchers.”

“And who fucking watches them?”

“They watch each other,” she explained patiently. “Because that's what humans do. They watch each other to make sure they're doing it right.”

Karkat snorted and Terezi felt the air move as he folded his arms. He was still defensive, but not backing down at all. It was sort of adorable in an aggressive way, like a tiny bloodthirsty barkbeast who is certain that he can take down the entire herd of musclebeasts alone. He was adorabloodthirsty, it was the only word for it.

“Right,” he said skeptically. “So humans are all born with malfunctioning thinkpans that make them insist on doing the most contradictory hoofbeast shit that they can pull out of the storm of mediocrity they constantly excrete into the air. I can believe that; it's pretty fucking obvious that as a species they are hopelessly and incurably incompetent. What's your excuse for being so wonderfully helpful- other than the fact that you are clearly insane?”

Terezi tilted her head and frowned thoughtfully. It was a good question, and the answer was complicated, but it was unlikely she could explain it at all clearly. Instead she went with the simplest reason. “The indigo-blood. I don't think he's guilty, which means someone else is. That person needs to be punished.”

Karkat glared. “What the fuck do you know?” He slumped back into the corner. “You're a complete fucking stranger. I'm his moirail. Gamzee did it, end of story.”

“If he's so guilty, why doesn't he smell like he's hiding anything?” Terezi demanded. Karkat scowled at her; this close, she could smell his brows furrowing.

“Oh, great. You fucking smelled that he was innocent. Why am I not surprised? Well, never mind, because that clears this right up! Let's just go and let everyone know that it couldn't possibly have been Gamzee because the blind girl thinks he smells nice. I'm sure that'll go down fantastically! They'll probably throw a city-wide party to celebrate our existence now that your brilliant fucking nose has exonerated him! And stop that cackling, it's creepy as shit!”

Terezi couldn't help it; she was in stitches. He was just so funny! Leaning over, she ran her tongue up his cheek. Yup, he still tasted delicious too. It was like someone had made a little troll mutant just for her!

“Will you fucking cut that out, you psychotic bitch? Fuck, I should call the law on _you_ for this! Get off!”

“I can taste your blood,” she told him, pulling back. “In fact, I can smell it from across the room. I can smell when someone is feeling tired or frightened or...” she licked him again and let him flail at her. “... grouchy. My best friend is a coolkid with no expressions and the only person better at reading him than me is a goofball human who's known him for years without ever actually seeing his face.” She stabbed a sharp finger into Karkat's chest, punctuating her words with jabs. “Your. Moirail. Is. Not. Guilty.”

She smelled the bright flavors of his eyes watching her. His thin chest moved up and down under her finger like he had just been running. In a way she supposed he had.

“Say I believe you,” he said after a moment. “What the fuck am I going to do about it?” He leaned forwards, face coming close enough that she could feel his warm breath on her cheek, and she could hear him tugging one-handed at his hair. “I can't just abandon him there. He needs me. Fuck, I need him. If he didn't do this then I have to get him out, only I fucking can't, because there's only one of me and I don't have a fucking clue...”

“Shoosh,” Terezi said, patting his face gently with an open palm. “Don't worry, I have a plan.”

“What fucking plan?”

She grinned broadly. “We catch the real Ringmaster,” she declared. Karkat went still.

“That is the most shithive insane, rotpanned, bulgebrained...”

The bedroom door swung open and he fell immediately silent as Matt walked out, head snapping around to face the human. Terezi heard Matt's footsteps pause. It suddenly occurred to her that she had managed to back Karkat into what could be taken as an extremely compromising position.

“So, do you two need more time, or...?” the human asked. Karkat snarled and shoved Terezi back, jumping to his feet and storming out of the corner. Terezi fell onto her ass and laughed at the embarrassment in the air; she was definitely going to have to tell Dave about this!

Meanwhile, Karkat had drawn close to Matt and taken something from him. “What the fuck is this?” he demanded. Terezi sidled up behind him and sniffed at the offending article. It smelled soft and worn and gray.

“Pajamas,” she said. “They're for sleeping in.”

Karkat scowled. “Why the everloving fuck would you want special clothes for sleeping in?”

“Because humans don't sleep in slime and it helps to keep you warm,” Terezi told him. She turned to Matt. “So how are we making this happen? Because I had the couch first.”

She felt the air shift as Matt ran his hands through his hair. “I guess Karkat can have my bed,” he said resignedly. “And I can set up some blankets and stuff on the floor...”

“Fuck, no,” Karkat said. When Matt started to protest, the troll boy snorted. “If I try to sleep on your fucking ridiculous human sleeping platform I'm going to wake up feeling like a musclebeast was tap-dancing on my back. I don't feel like torturing both of us just to pander to your nonsensical human customs, so just give me some some crap to build a pile with and I'll be fine.”

Matt shrugged, a ripple in the air. “If you're sure,” he agreed. “Terezi, you okay with him sleeping out here?”

“Wait, what?” Karkat yelped as Terezi nodded happily. “You didn't say I had to fucking sleep out here with her! I'm going to get fucking molested in my sleep!”

“You volunteered, kid,” Matt said, strolling back into the bedroom to find some additional bedding as Karkat yelled curses at his retreating back.

It didn't take too long to get Karkat's pile set up, and Terezi had to admit that the big soft heap felt pretty inviting. Karkat was in his pajamas and was so obviously sleepy that Matt and Terezi took one look- and sniff- at him and in silent conspiracy declared it to be bedtime. He had protested, objecting wholeheartedly to the idea of going to bed so early- _what kind of slimedripping wigglers went to bed on this planet before the sun was even properly down, you would have to be fucking stupid_ \- but as soon as his head hit the blankets he was out cold. Now Terezi was lying on the couch, listening to him twitch in his sleep and wondering exactly how mad he would be if she snuck onto the pile in the night. She wasn't moving over for anything less than a minute long rant.

When he let out the first few whimpers and sobs, she didn't pay much attention. No sopor slime meant nightmares, although they were nowhere near as bad now Gl'bgolyb was dead and her corpse light-years away. When the sobs started to become muffled howls, she started to wonder, and at the first actual scream she was jumping off the couch to check him more closely. Her fingertips and her nose told her he was still asleep, but from the way he was thrashing and screaming she couldn't understand how. He was even babbling, saying things that sounded pleading in an unfamiliar Alternian dialect. Not even trollish nightmares were supposed to be this dramatic, and for a moment she considered going and getting Matt- he was a heavy sleeper, and never woke up for anything that wasn't his alarm or a phone call, so he would sleep right through this. After a moment she dismissed the idea; he wouldn't know what to do any more than she did. If anyone other than a moirail or a matesprit tried to wake Karkat while he was like this they would probably end up badly hurt. It was probably a bad idea to have touched him at all, but she had wanted to be sure his eyes were closed. With no other ideas springing to mind, Terezi settled into the pile beside him, reaching over to restrain him every time his thrashing grew too violent. As time passed his throat became too raw to scream and he quieted to hoarse, pained gasping. The strange words that flowed from his mouth changed too, became more and more desperate before falling silent. It was disturbing in a way that Terezi's own dreams had never quite managed to be, and after a while it occurred to her that it was because whatever was happening in Karkat's head, it sounded real.

Then the words came back, only this time they were bitter and vicious, and if anything that was worse. Terezi could hear hatred bubbling between the hoarse sobs and the agonized howls and she could smell the sickening sense of futility that surrounded it. She had culled people before, not all of them cleanly, but this was the first time she had heard someone so clearly being tortured. It made her angry- not with the thin teenager lying next to her on the pile, but with whatever fucked up piece of his past had made him ever have this dream. Determined that the adorabloodthirsty cherry-red troll boy was not going through this alone, she reached out and wrapped her hand around his.

She wasn't sure exactly when she fell asleep, but her dreams were bloodier than they had been for a long while. The shadows of her dark courtroom swallowed victim after screaming victim, and every time she brought down the gavel another weeping figure with the face of a friend was torn apart to join the pile of limbs in the center of the floor. She raised and slammed the small hammer down mechanically, again and again, unable to stop her hand from moving and enjoying the sick thrill of death and power. Bow before Her Tyranny! There is no defense. All are guilty.

She was woken by a sharp, insistent beeping from her smartphone. For several long minutes Terezi lay there, before it occurred to her that she should really answer whoever it was. A brief sniff of the air told her that it was early morning, and Karkat was sleeping quietly beside her. She fished around for her cell and licked the screen curiously to discover a honey-mustard Pesterchum message from a handle she had last seen many, many sweeps before.

\-- twinArmageddons [TA] began pestering gallowsCalibrator [GC] at 06:27 --  
TA: hey tz  
TA: wake up and let me talk two that mutant fucka22 kk

Interesting. Terezi brought up the keyboard function and tapped out a response.

GC: W3LL W3LL  
GC: LONG TIME NO S33 T4  
GC: M1ND T3LL1NG M3 HOW YOU KNOW 4BOUT MY HOUS3GU3ST >:]  
GC: OR MY N4M3 FOR TH4T M4TT3R

The response was quick and fluid.

TA: fuck2 2ake tz  
TA: you fuckiing well know ii wa2 the greate2t hacker on alterniia  
TA: you really thiink ii got 2tupiid on the triip?  
TA: now let me talk two kk before ii make your riidiiculou2 phone explode liike that biitch2 hu2ktop

Terezi barked with laughter.

GC: ST1LL NOT 4N 4NSW3R 1'M 4FR41D  
GC: BUT 3V3N 1F 1T W4S 1 COULDN'T H3LP YOU  
GC: H3'S 4SL33P

The next response was only one line long.

TA: better move away from hiim then

Terezi wasn't stupid enough to stay put when someone gave her a message like that; even less so when the someone in question could be planning to make her smartphone explode. She dropped the cell and scrambled back from the pile onto the couch. Moments later the phone started to emit a cacophony of piercing, whistling, rattling, clashing sound. Terezi slammed her hands over her ears to try and keep the racket out, but Karkat had no such luxury. It was only a few second before dulled tones of his yelling hit her covered ears.

“What the fuck...” he hollered, the air shifting as he reached for the cell in a sweeping gesture that was clearly intended to end in it hurtling across the room, preferably towards the nearest wall. Halfway through the motion, he froze, and Terezi cautiously pulled her hands from her ears as the noise abruptly stopped.

“Sollux?” he said, and if she hadn't just heard it Terezi would never have imagined he could sound so soft. She was so amazed at the gentleness in Karkat's voice that it took her a moment to put two and two together.

“Wait, Sollux?” she asked. “As in the Helmsman?”

She heard the small exasperated puff of breath escape Karkat. “No, you rotpanned moron, some other Sollux. Of course the fucking Helmsman... ow!” He yelped and pulled his scratched hand back as Terezi snatched her cellphone back and typed furiously.

GC: WHY SOLLUX  
GC: YOU N3V3R M3NT1ON3D YOU B3C4M3 4 C3L3BR1TY  
GC: OR TH4T K4RKL3S W4S 4 FR13ND OF YOURS >:]

The reply was swift and irascible, and Terezi could feel Karkat leaning over her shoulder to read the words.

TA: of cour2e he2 my friiend you 2tupiid biitch  
TA: why the fuck el2e would ii wa2te my tiime wiith hii2 melodramatiic crap?  
TA: now giive hiim the fuckiing cellphone before ii lo2e my 2hiit  
TA: iim iin a hurry here

Karkat didn't wait for Terezi's permission; he grabbed the smartphone out of her hands as viciously as she had stolen it from him seconds before and didn't even bother pulling it back over her head before he started typing. Terezi leaned close to the screen and sniffed at the words, honey-yellow mixing with her own bitter sea-salt shade.

GC: SOLLUX, IT'S ME.  
GC: I MEAN, FUCK, IT'S KARKAT.  
GC: FUCK.

“Not very erudite,” she critiqued. Karkat smacked her in the back of the head before examining Sollux's response.

TA: oh my god, kk  
TA: iim 2o 2orry  
TA: iim 2o fuckiing 2orry  
TA: ii 2hould have tracked you down year2 ago  
TA: ii am the wor2t friiend

Karkat snorted bitterly, then started to type. He was a tight little ball, hunched over in fury and stinking of rage, but Terezi wasn't fooled. She could pick out the delicate scent of tears on his face, so close behind her own. She considered giving him some privacy, then decided that privacy was stupid and instead sniffed at his growing diatribe.

GC: DAMN FUCKING RIGHT YOU'RE THE WORST FRIEND, YOU AND YOUR FUCKING BRILLIANT SHIP PLAN.  
GC: “HEY, KK, LET'S LEAVE ALTERNIA!”  
GC: “THEN I CAN ABANDON YOU ON AN ALIEN PLANET AND WAIT UNTIL YOUR LIFE IS COMPLETELY FUCKED UP IN EVERY WAY IMAGINABLE BEFORE I THINK TO CONTACT YOU AGAIN!”  
GC: SO ARE YOU HERE TO RUB MY FACE IN HOW YOU'RE LIVING THE FUCKING HIGH LIFE AS A POLITICAL BIGSHOT, OR DID YOU JUST WANT TO CREEP ME THE FUCK OUT WITH YOUR INTERNET STALKING PROWESS?  
GC: NO, I DON'T ACTUALLY CARE. EITHER WAY, FUCK YOU CAPTOR.  
GC: I AM FEELING ENOUGH RAGE RIGHT NOW TO REACH OUT THROUGH THE WIRELESS ETHER OF SPACE AND CHOKE YOU WITH THE POWER OF MY WILL ALONE.  
GC: IF IT WAS UP TO ME, YOU WOULD BE GURGLING AND FIGHTING FOR BREATH AS YOU DEFILED YOUR KEYBOARD WITH YOUR OWN DISGUSTING YELLOW SALIVA.  
GC: HOW DARE YOU TALK TO ME. HOW DARE YOU FIND ME.  
GC: HOW DARE YOU EVER EVEN THINK THAT THERE WAS THE REMOTEST CHANCE I WOULD FORGIVE YOU FOR DOING THIS TO ME?  
GC: YOU COMPLETE GRUBMUNCHING FUCKASS. I HATE YOU.  
GC: PLATONICALLY.

Karkat sat back from his effort with an angry puff of breath and scrubbed roughly at the tears on his face. Terezi whistled, impressed with his vitriol and momentarily rendered speechless. Not everyone seemed to have that problem, though, as Pesterchum gently chimed. This time Terezi had to shove her head into Karkat's eye-line to examine the screen, ignoring his angry protests as she tasted the words. They were the same tangy sweet yellow shade, but a different voice spoke from behind the lines.

TA: How DAR---E you!  
TA: Glub!  
TA: Sollux was ---E---ELY --EXCITED TO TALK TO YOU AGAIN!  
TA: He paid your bail so you wouldn't have to sleep in a PRISON SH---ELL!  
TA: He spent ALL NIGHT looking for something to H---ELP YOUR GLUBBING MOIRAIL!  
TA: And you just said all those HORRIBUBBL---E SH---ELLFISH things to him when he already felt SO GUILTY about ---EV---ERYTHING!  
TA: He's crying right now! WHAL---E I HOP------E YOU'R---------E HAPPY!

Terezi could taste a flush rising on Karkat's face, could smell the embarrassment and shame in his blood as he typed.

GC: FUCK.  
GC: CAPTOR, IF YOU'RE READING THIS, I'M SORRY.  
GC: I AM SUCH NOOKWHIFFING BULGESCUM. I SHOULDN'T EVEN BE ALLOWED AROUND DECENT PEOPLE.  
GC: I SHOULD JUST GO AND CRAWL INTO A FUCKING GARBAGE RECEPTACLE AND WAIT TO BE TAKEN TO THE DUMP WITH THE REST OF THE REFUSE.  
GC: EXCEPT THE DUMP TRUCK WOULD PROBABLY SPIT ME OUT TO PREVENT ME FROM FOULING UP THE MASSIVE PILES OF UNWANTED TRASH WITH MY DISGUSTING EXISTENCE.  
GC: I AM SO FUCKING LOW THAT EVEN CARRION EATERS WOULD CONSIDER ME A FOUL AND INDIGESTIBLE HEAP OF SHIT. THERE IS LITERALLY NOBODY AND NOTHING IN THE ENTIRE UNIVERSE WORTH LESS THAN ME.

Terezi, reading from Karkat's lap, was about to interrupt him when someone else did it for her.

TA: 2hut the fuck up kk  
TA: and don't lii2ten two ff, 2he doe2n't get u2

Karkat sniffled. Terezi wondered whether he realized or cared that he had just been chewed out by the Heiress herself. Probably not, she thought, as she tasted his reply.

GC: THIS IS NOT OKAY. I MADE YOU CRY.  
GC: I'M SORRY.  
GC: ARE WE STILL FRIENDS?

There was no hesitation in the answer.

TA: of cour2e we are

Terezi felt a change in Karkat, tension releasing from muscles as he slumped back into the pile of human bedding. She fell with him and wriggled round so that she was still facing the screen directly as the mutant-blood typed.

GC: SO WHAT WAS THAT YELLING ABOUT YOU HAVING SOMETHING TO HELP MY MOIRAIL?  
GC: DO I EVEN WANT TO KNOW HOW YOU KNOW ABOUT THAT?

Terezi pouted. “So you won't take help from me, but you will from him?”

“He's my oldest fucking friend,” Karkat replied irascibly. “Whereas you are a shithive maggots stranger who licks anything that stays still for half a fucking nanosecond. Look, fuck, you've even got your dumbass teal spit all over the screen!” He wiped the fluid gingerly away with one sleeve to reveal Sollux's reply. Terezi cautiously sniffed at the device and got the message sharp and clear.

TA: you probably don't want two know how ii know  
TA: but ii do have 2omethiing that miight help

Karkat nearly bit through his lip, he tensed so much.

GC: SO WHAT THE FUCK IS IT?

He wasn't the only one with bated breath. For all that Terezi had said she wanted to clear Gamzee and catch the Ringmaster, she hadn't had a clue where to start. This could be the windfall of information she had been waiting for.

TA: well, 2iince the biigge2t que2tiion iin hii2 ca2e ii2 hii2 complete lack of an aliibii  
TA: ii ju2t 2pent the be2t part of la2t niight combiing through cctv footage  
TA: tryiing two fiigure out where he went  
TA: whiich wa2 not ea2y, by the way- do you know how many cctv camera2 there are iin thii2 ciity?  
TA: ii had two wriite a whole new algoriithm and code iit

Sollux's lines of text were interrupted by more sea-salt fury from Karkat.

GC: FOR FUCK'S SAKE, CAPTOR, THIS IS MY PALE QUADRANT WE'RE TALKING ABOUT.  
GC: WE ALL KNOW YOU'RE IMPRESSIVE AND AN AMAZING HACKER.  
GC: NOW TELL ME WHAT THE FUCK YOU FOUND OUT BEFORE I HUNT YOU DOWN AND FUCKING TURN YOU INTO A RUG, YOU SMUG FUCKWAD.

Terezi cackled. “You tell him, Karkles!” A rough hand shoved her irritably in the shoulder as Karkat read the response.

TA: you know on thii2 planet they 2ay that patiience ii2 a viirtue?

Terezi couldn't help giggling as Karkat hissed.

GC: FUCK YOU.  
GC: MY MOIRAIL IS ROTTING ALONE IN JAIL RIGHT NOW. STOP WASTING OUR TIME.

“Yours and mine?” Terezi asked.

“No, mine and Gamzee's,” Karkat told her with a snarl. “I could fucking care less about your time, you lunatic. Why are you even still here? Is my private fucking conversation interesting enough for you?”

Grinning, Terezi decided to take his words at face value. “Oh yes, thank you,” she replied, ignoring his growl as she licked the screen again.

TA: fiine, 2iince you are determiined two be 2uch a biitch about iit  
TA: every tiime your clown-faced a22hole went walkiie2 he ended up iin the 2ame three-block radiiu2  
TA: before vanii2hiing

“Vanishing?” Karkat wondered aloud.

GC: WAIT, WHAT THE FUCK DO YOU MEAN, VANISHING?

Terezi had to agree with the sentiment. If Sollux could track the suspect to such a small area, it seemed odd that he could suddenly evade surveillance. Even if her nose had said Gamzee was sharper than he seemed. But Sollux was adamant.

TA: ii mean what ii 2aid  
TA: for 2ome rea2on there are no cctv camera2 workiing iin that three-block radiiu2  
TA: ii mean iit2 a 2hiity area 2o there aren't a2 many a2 there 2hould be around iit anyway  
TA: but wherever he wa2 goiing ii2 a total bliind 2pot  
TA: and he doe2n't appear on any other cctv untiil hour2 later, comiing out of the 2ame area

Ooh, interesting. Terezi snaked out a hand and grabbed the smartphone from Karkat's grip.

“Hey!” he squawked. She stuck her tongue out.

“It belongs to me,” she told him. “And I want to talk to Sollux.” Karkat snarled and tried to grab the device back, so she rolled over on the pile to shield the smartphone with her body as she typed a response.

GC: C4N YOU D1R3CT US TO TH1S LOC4T1ON?

Karkat scrambled over Terezi and dug the claws of one hand into her arm, digging through the cloth of her pajamas and hauling the cellphone back into reach of his other hand with brute force. Terezi swiped her tongue across the screen for one last taste of Sollux's reply before letting Karkat take the device.

TA: 2ure, knock yourselves out  
TA: except don't  
TA: be careful, kk- whatever wa2 goiing down out there, he diidn't want anyone two know about iit  
TA: even iif iit meant goiing two prii2on on a multiiple homiicide rap  
TA: dangerou2 ii2 not even clo2e two the feeliing ii am getting about thii2  
\-- twinArmageddons [TA] sent file gz_bliind2pot_here.gps at 06:51 --

As the file downloaded, Terezi focused on wheedling her way back into a position where she could smell the screen. Karkat was curled up, hunched defensively over the device, and kept scooting around to block her access. In the end Terezi grabbed his arm and stuck her head under it. Karkat yelped.

“The fuck are you doing?”

“I just want to see,” she told him, taking a quick taste of the words he had already typed.

GC: SURE, SEND ME INTO DANGER AGAIN.  
GC: YOU ARE SUCH A SHITTY FRIEND.

“You'd better not fucking steal it again,” the mutant boy grumbled. Terezi cackled.

“You are the thief, not me,” she told him. “But it's okay. I will forgive you since you taste so delicious!”

“Freak,” Karkat muttered, as Pesterchum chimed with Sollux's reply.

TA: 2ay thankyou

Karkat sighed, but he didn't really sound that upset.

GC: THANKS, FUCKASS.  
GC: TALK TO YOU LATER WHEN I'M DONE SAVING MY IDIOT MOIRAIL.  
\-- gallowsCalibrator [GC] ceased pestering twinArmageddons [TA] at 06:56 --

Suddenly Terezi was alone on the pile, the smartphone in her hand. She rolled over to smell Karkat picking up some of the clothes that Matt had left out for him the previous night.

“What are you doing?” she asked.

“Going to find Gamzee's alibi,” he snapped. “And don't even fucking think about trying to stop me!”

Terezi rolled up off the pile and chuckled. “Stop you?” she asked, padding over to where her own daytime clothes were neatly folded and gathering them up.

“Karkles, I'm coming with you!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Things which are deceptively difficult: Terezi and Sollux's typing quirks. Seriously. If anyone spots any "i"s or "s"s or instances of the words "to" or "too" in Sollux's bits, or any "I"s, "E"s or "A"s in Terezi's, let me know. It's been a real pain trying to catch them all.
> 
> Also: more than 2000 hits. I am gobsmacked. Divided by the number of chapters so far to get a (very) rough estimate, that means more than 125 people reading this. I adore you all so much right now. SO MUCH.
> 
> You may all have pretend cookies. All of you.


	18. ==> Be The Determined Adolescent Fuckup

### CHAPTER SEVENTEEN ==> Be The Determined Adolescent Fuckup

Karkat Vantas didn't trust this neighborhood one bit. It was the sort of place that was virtually dead in the daylight, every other building boarded up with cheap chipboard and more than half of those broken into regardless. At the end of the road, an unlit neon sign proclaimed “XXX” over a suspiciously shrouded storefront; the only car visible on the street was the burned-out husk whose hood he was perched on. His eyes flickered about constantly as he tried to watch the different ends of the street and keep Terezi in sight. Every instinct he had ever gained in his entire life was screaming at him. Fuck everything that crazy bitch had said about humans, fuck any idea that they might let two unprepared kids pass unharmed. He could feel the strangers watching them, had caught sight of flickers of movement in the surrounding buildings and was wary of the suspicious stare of the old, drunk hobo at the end of the street.

Karkat knew in his digestive tract that they were outnumbered and surrounded. If they looked for a second like rivals- or worse, victims- the cops would never even find their bodies. The knowledge that Gamzee had come here regularly, alone, would have been enough to send him into a full-blown panic attack if he hadn't been too busy watching for danger from every angle.

“Are you fucking done yet?” he demanded of his fellow investigator, watching as she gingerly licked the post of a streetlight. “Or are there some paving slabs you haven't slobbered over yet?”

Terezi chuckled. “Patience, Karkles,” she admonished, grinning at him. “I tracked Gamzee's scent to this street; now I just have to work out where he went from here.”

“You're going to fucking kill yourself licking everything,” Karkat told her. “You are going to catch an Earth disease from the shit you are consuming, and you are going to die in agony with your internal organs liquidizing and pouring out of your auricular sponge-holes, and I am going to laugh my ass off because it fucking serves you right for being a complete rotpanned slimesucker.”

Terezi wandered over to sniff at a rusted and bent chain-link fence. “I'm disappointed in you, Karkles. Didn't you pay any attention when they released you from Quarantine?”

Karkat scowled. “What the fuck does that have to do with anything?”

Terezi thoughtfully lapped at one of the rusted diamonds of wire. “We're immune to most Earth diseases, and vice versa for humans,” she said. “Something about biochemical differences. We can be carriers for each other's infections, but we can't actually get sick from them.”

“Okay, so you'll poison yourself instead,” Karkat snarled. “Same fucking difference when you're agonizingly dead.”

Terezi just cackled by way of reply and returned to her detailed study of the fence; Karkat went back to scanning their surroundings for threats. Terezi had chosen to wear a bright red long-sleeved tee-shirt under her short-sleeved teal top. Anywhere else it wouldn't have drawn comment for anything other than the hideous clashing colors, but Karkat knew that around here the brightness was drawing attention and getting her filed under “stupid kid with money”. He'd clocked enough strangers that way himself in the past. He pulled a hand out of the pocket of the shapeless gray hoodie he had swathed himself in- on account of not being a complete fucking idiot who painted targets on himself- and pulled the hood up over his head. The gesture didn't do much to stop the back of his neck prickling with unwanted attention.

“Look, can we please get a fucking move on?” he asked his blind partner. She might be fucking amazing at smelling things out, but there was no way she could fight without vision and he wasn't sure he could protect them both if shit kicked off. Terezi ignored him to bend down and gingerly pick up a large fragment of broken bottle. Gamzee would have called it a miracle, how she avoided slicing her fingers up on the sharp edges. Karkat didn't really give a shit, even if his fingers did tighten on the car hood when she brazenly stuck out her tongue and licked it.

“Definitely this way,” she said, dropping the glass and ducking through the three-foot high hole in the fence. Karkat scrambled to catch up with her, squeezing to the other side as she waited for him atop a pile of rubble and discarded crap. By the time he reached her she had caught Gamzee's scent on the arm of a disemboweled couch, and despite his protests she caught him by the hand and dragged him around the corner of the next building over. A set of stained concrete steps led down to an open basement door, peeling blue paint not hiding the deep cracks in the wood. Terezi licked the equally decrepit safety rail and nodded.

“Down there,” she said. Karkat wrenched his hand out of her grip and folded his arms, moving back a couple of steps.

“You have got to be fucking joking,” he said flatly. “There could be anyone, anything, down there. I'm not even fucking armed!”

“I am,” Terezi grinned, holding her white cane like it was actually a fucking weapon and not an aid- which admittedly, she didn't really seem to need, but still...

“Not a fucking chance,” Karkat told her bluntly. She shrugged and set out towards the basement steps.

“Fine,” she said cheerfully. “I'm sure your moirail will understand when you explain to him why you couldn't help me clear his name.”

Cursing, Karkat hurried after her. She pushed gently at the door with her cane and it swung a little more inwards, allowing them entrance to the room beyond. It took Karkat's eyes a moment to adjust to the darkness as they stepped inside, but after a few moments he could clearly see the room they were stood in.

“What the fuck?” he asked on general principles. Terezi's brow creased.

“What is it?” she asked. “I can't smell anything.”

“That's because there's nothing to fucking smell! FUCK!” Karkat yelled, kicking angrily at one of the empty milk crates that littered the floor- the bare concrete floor, as featureless and dull as all four walls and the ceiling, broken up only by empty boxes and used bottles that had once held alcohol or milk or sopor. It was just regular detritus, the coating of junk that any barely habitable space in this city picked up sooner or later, and none of it offered any explanation as to what Gamzee could possibly have been doing there to come back with money and secrets.

Slowly, Karkat sank to his knees on the ground, defeated by the sheer blankness of the dead end. Terezi crouched down in front of him.

“He came down here,” she said. “And there was a reason.” She reached out a hand towards him. “But we won't find anything if we stop searching.”

Karkat looked up and noticed that although her fanged smile split her face, her gaze was still slightly over his left shoulder. Well, fuck that. If the blind weirdo wasn't giving up, there was no fucking way he would either.

“Fine,” he snarled, grabbing her hand and letting her help haul him to his feet. Might as well let her feel useful. He looked around the bare room once more. “I guess we can start checking this trash for clues.”

Terezi nodded solemnly. “Yes, that would be...” she broke off and whirled towards the door, cane raising into a ready position. Karkat reacted to her alarm, turning on the spot and casting about for a weapon, any weapon.

Too late, because a dark shadow fell across the doorway and then resolved into a tall, dark-skinned man wearing a very nice suit and hat, grinning in a way humans should not be capable of as he raised a gun from his side. Karkat stared at the weapon, held as easily and steadily as if it were a part of the man himself. Beside him, Terezi sniffed the air and carefully lowered her cane.

“Well, what do we have here?” the human asked, eyes flicking between the two frozen teenagers. “I'd say you brats should be more careful whose business you stick your noses into, but I don't really think you're gonna get a chance to take the advice.”

“Who are you?” Terezi asked, sounding more curious than terrified. Karkat, eyes still fixed on the gun barrel, wondered how the fuck she could be so calm. Surely she knew about the gun; she must have smelled it, given everything else she could apparently scent out.

“I'm the man who's been watching you two turn this neighborhood over all morning,” the human said, sounding as if he was having a pleasant chat with them rather than being seconds away from turning them into corpses. “Looked like quite a search; well, congratulations. You found something.” He raised the gun, pointing it straight at Karkat. “Stand still and I promise to make it real quick,” he added.

“Wait!” Karkat blurted, not even sure what he could possibly offer this man in exchange for his life. The human cocked his head in mild curiosity and Karkat swallowed, looked back to Terezi uncertainly. Maybe if he told the man she was blind, humans got all weepy about that sort of thing- but it was already pretty fucking obvious, and he didn't seem to give a shit. Terezi seemed to sense Karkat's uncertainty, and slowly her face split into a wide grin.

“Did you know that Gamzee Makara has been arrested?” she asked the human. To Karkat's amazement, that actually seemed to phase him for a second. A deep scowl appeared on the man's face and he moved closer to the pair of them, staying just out of arm's reach.

“Congratulations, you just got a stay of execution,” he snarled. “Now do what I say and don't even think about running, or I'm gonna use both of you for target practice.” He gestured towards the door with his free hand. “Move.”

Karkat did as he was ordered and hoped that Terezi would have the sense to do the same. To his relief, she followed just behind him, the pair of them walking out of the door and up the steps with the armed stranger following a few paces behind them. As they waited for him to catch up, Karkat risked leaning over and whispering to Terezi.

“When we get to the road, you go left and I'll go right. He can't shoot us both...”

Terezi snorted and waved an admonishing finger under his nose. “He knows something about Gamzee,” she whispered back. “And I am going to see this through to the end, with or without your cherry-colored assistance.” She paused thoughtfully. “Although I would prefer if you did not get murdered,” she added.

Karkat hissed, cheeks flushing in anger. “Fuck's sake, are you actually completely shithive maggots?” he demanded, still keeping his voice low. “This guy is obviously a stone-cold fucking killer and he's not just going to let us...”

“That's enough of that!” their captor barked harshly, stopping a few feet from them with the gun still steadily trained. His eyes narrowed as he glared from one to the other. “I only need one of you alive to talk and I don't need either of you in one piece, so be good little kids and do as you're fucking told.” He pointed with his free hand towards the street and smiled carnivorously. “Now march.”

They marched, and Karkat didn't dare to make a break for it on his own. He sweated with tension, constantly aware of the weapon a few scant feet from his back, and obediently followed the stranger's directions to one of the broken down, abandoned buildings across the street. It seemed identical to all the others, and when he glanced at Terezi she just shrugged; Gamzee hadn't been there. The front door was loosely boarded up, but when they slipped through a broken gate and down the filthy alley the side door proved to open at a touch. As Karkat stepped into the dim light of the interior it took his eyes a moment to adjust, but when they did he yelped and jumped backwards in alarm.

Sitting behind a barricade of broken furniture and sandbags sat a short, burly human who was dreamily training a tripod-mounted _automatic fucking cannon_ on them.

“Jesus dick, Deuce, it's me!” yelled their escort. The short man blinked in surprise, then his face lit up with a childish delight that was completely, utterly incongruous with the piles of weaponry around him.

“Hi Droog!” he said, his voice oddly high-pitched. Their tall kidnapper sighed.

“Just let us through the back, will you?” he asked patiently. The little man nodded enthusiastically, head bobbing up and down like it was on a spring.

“Sure thing, Droog!” he agreed. Their captor gestured past the barricade towards a door that seemed to be in fairly good repair, and Karkat started walking forward with Terezi next to him. As they drew level with the little man, Terezi paused and turned her head towards him.

“Are you by any chance the infamous Clubs Deuce?” she asked. The little guy squeaked.

“Sure am, miss!” he gleefully reported. “Who are you?”

“She's a broad that's asking to get lead for lunch, is who she is,” Droog growled behind them. “Move it, missy.”

Terezi cackled a little as she drew level with Karkat, but he couldn't respond; his digestive sac was leaden with fear and well en-route to the floor. If that was Clubs Deuce then the man with the gun had to be Diamonds Droog, which meant that they had just been captured by the fucking Midnight Crew, who everyone in this city with half a brain knew were the most vicious bunch of assfucks to ever take up a life of crime. In fact, they didn't just take it up; no, they grabbed it by the scruff of the neck, slammed its head into the floor, kicked the ever-loving fuck out of it and stabbed it a few times before emptying crime's pockets and telling it to never, ever be late on the payments again. At least the Felt were polite when they did you over; at least in some twisted way they looked after the people whose lives they fucked up. The Midnight Crew were thugs by comparison, except that they had elevated mere thuggery to some sort of fucking _art form_ in which every other sentient being on the planet was their canvas.

And they knew Gamzee's name, were concerned enough about his arrest to not immediately kill two kids sniffing around their territory. It was definitely their territory, no doubt about that; Karkat was pretty sure he knew why there was no CCTV active in this area, and he was going to fucking kill Sollux for getting him into this, and oh shit no wonder Gamzee hadn't wanted to tell him anything. What the fuck had his moirail been caught up in?

The back room was shadowy and fogged with smoke; as Terezi coughed, Karkat made out two figures in the gloom. One, the most immense man he had ever seen in his life, was reclining on one of the large boxes that appeared to be stored at one end of the room and keeping an eye on what looked like a back door. The other man was sat hunched over a cheap desk, muttering and hissing to himself as he stabbed angrily at the wood with a very, very sharp knife.

“Sit,” Droog ordered, dragging a metal folding chair away from the wall one-handed and dumping it in front of the desk. Karkat obeyed as Droog repeated the motion, and sat stiffly facing the knife-wielding man as Terezi sat next to him. He tried not to look too closely at the man in front of him, knowing that the more he saw the less likely he was to live, but it was hard not to see the mess of dark hair peeking out from under a plain, serviceable hat, or the thick black stubble that contrasted deeply with white-pale skin. Karkat knew without being told who this man was. There was only one person he could be.

As Karkat felt cold metal handcuffs click into place around his wrists, fastening him to the chair, the man behind the desk looked up at them. Suddenly Karkat was met with the full force of a glare from the intense green eyes of Spades Slick, leader of the Midnight Crew and second only to the Ringmaster himself as the most wanted man in the city.

“What the fuck is this?” he snapped, eyes flicking impatiently past them to Diamonds Droog. Karkat couldn't see the other man behind him, and from the way Terezi's face was screwed up he guessed that the thick, choking smell of cigars was seriously impairing her ability to know where anyone was at all.

“Oh, they've been sniffing around the area all morning,” Droog said airily. “Literally, in the case of the girl. Anyway, they managed to find their way to the meet-point, so I figured I should actually do something.”

Spades snarled. “So fucking shoot them! Don't drag them in here to piss me off!” He emphasized his words by stabbing his knife into the table with a solid THUNK. Karkat swallowed nervously; he couldn't quite take his eyes off the blade.

“They said something about Gamzee getting pinched,” Droog told his boss. Spade's face furrowed even deeper.

“Who the fuck is Gamzee?” he demanded.

Karkat heard a sigh from behind him before Droog spoke again. “He's that troll kid,” he said patiently. “The purple-blooded one. With the long horns, up to here? Swears worse than you do?”

Spades continued to look blank and Droog's voice took on an impatient tone. “For fuck's sake, Spades, you talked to him a few nights ago! He stood lookout while we hit that warehouse!”

Faint recognition flickered. “Wait, you mean the one with the scars?” Spades asked, drawing three fingers across his face in a pattern that Karkat recognized immediately and intimately.

“Yes, the one with the fucking scars,” Droog confirmed, his voice no more pleased by his leader's understanding. “He's been picked up by the cops.”

Spades hissed. “Great. Little fuck's probably blabbing everything he knows right now.” He yanked the knife out of the table. “I fucking hate killing people in the slammer,” he muttered.

“No!” Karkat blurted out, and wondered why the fuck he had done that when everyone turned to look at him. Spades sneered and fiddled with his blade.

“You got a problem, kid?” he demanded. “Because right now it's your own fucking hide you should be worrying about, get it?”

Karkat stared at the man, all hard lines and sharp angles and a single spinning blade in the light, and realized that he was going to die. Then, as Gamzee would have put it, the motherfucking miracle happened.

“Nubby horns,” rumbled a voice from the back of the room. Spades looked up past Karkat and Terezi, and Karkat heard a shifting noise as the hegemonic brute got up and lumbered towards them. One huge hand grabbed his hair and pulled his head back, and he caught a glimpse of a round, shining face with a broken nose and small oinkbeast eyes before one sausage finger started to prod at his horns- and then it got into the horn-bed and ooh fuuuuuuuuck...

Karkat went limp, every muscle in his body relaxing as his submission reflex kicked in. It was kind of nice, the endorphin rush, and some part of his brain that was still bothering to work right pointed out that at least this way it would hurt a lot less when they killed him. Then it was overridden by the last vestiges of blind instinct screaming that he should not be this fucking helpless in front of anyone ever, and by the much larger part of himself that just wanted to drift aimlessly and let whatever happened, happen. Karkat could hear voices still, and hey, why not listen to those, right?

“... did you do to him?” Terezi was asking. She sounded kind of worried about something. Karkat muzzily wondered what.

“Yeah, Hearts, I think you fucking broke him or something,” Spades growled. “What the fuck were you thinking?”

“I dunno, boss,” rumbled the big guy- Hearts Boxcar, Karkat guessed, and it was pretty fun to guess things so he giggled a little. Or tried to anyway; what actually came out sounded more like a hiccup, and he drooled a little. His instincts informed him that he was a grubfucking moron and was he actually making some sort of active attempt to humiliate himself? Was that what was happening here?

“Karkat?” Terezi whispered. Hey, that was his name. He made a titanic effort and managed to roll his head to the side to look at her, letting out another little hiccup giggle at the look of concern on her face and not really caring that some of his hair came out in Hearts' meaty fist.

“Mmnn,” he told her.

“I reckon he's the one what Gamz was always talkin' about,” Hearts was saying above him. “Yer know, he's got these little nubby candy corn horns, right, and that's what Gamz was sayin', what he had a little nubby-horned bro.”

 _Gamzee, you stupid fuck, I am going to kill you for telling these psychopaths that I even exist, let alone what I look like!_ The thoughts were happening in Karkat's head, but they seemed to belong to somebody else. Somebody far away. Terezi was still whispering to him but she was sort of quiet and he couldn't really understand what she was trying to say so he listened to the noisy humans instead.

“So what?” Droog was pointing out. “We know he knows Gamzee, how is that relevant to anything?”

“Nah, yer don't gets it,” Hearts rumbled, sounding a little distressed. “He's like that troll thing, whaddya call it. Moyrals.”

“What the fuck is a moyrals?” Spades demanded.

Hearts seemed somewhat perplexed by the question. “I dunno, boss, it's like bein' blood-brothers or some shit, but they're callin' it romance?” He sighed. “Look, all I know is that Gamz is a sweet kid what ain't never done us wrong, and this li'l fucker's like to be the most important person in his life, so I ain't cool with killin' nobody until we got us a proper picture of what this thing is about, is all.”

Spades buried his face in one hand. “Fucking figures you'd get all sappy about this,” he groaned. He waved his knife at Terezi. “What about her? Can we fucking kill her?”

There was a brief pause. “I ain't got no problems with that,” Hearts said.

“Well, I do,” Droog interjected. “Look at this!” Karkat felt a sharp impact on the back of his head, and the force knocked it to loll forwards. It sort of hurt a little, so he let out a small whimper which somehow got muted on the way to his lips. His muscles wouldn't work to pull his head up, so he left it hanging forwards. The furious voice inside him was starting to scream a little louder now and he sort of wished it would just shut up and let him relax.

“Whatever you did, Hearts, he's fucking useless now,” Droog said. “You want answers, then the girl's the only one who can explain anything.”

“Fine,” Spades snarled, slamming the knife into the table again. “She can start with how the cops connected the troll brat to us.”

“But they didn't!” Terezi said, and Karkat smiled because she sounded as confident as ever. Although there was something bad about that. What was it again? Oh yeah, he was helpless and she wasn't. Not that he really gave a shit about that right now, but he had the feeling he was going to care later- if they both lived that long.

“So what were you doing round here, girlie?” Spades demanded. Terezi threw her head back and cackled.

“We were looking for Gamzee's alibi!”

Spades growled and yanked the knife out of the wood again, leaning so far over the desk that he nearly crawled up onto it. “What the fuck are you talking about? You think this is funny, you little shit? You think we're playing around here?”

A long, well-tailored arm reached out and held the furious man back. “Wait,” Diamonds Droog said, eyes narrowing thoughtfully. “What do you mean, looking for his alibi? What was Gamzee arrested for?”

Out of the corner of his eye, Karkat could see Terezi grinning. “They think he's the Ringmaster,” she said, triumphant.

There was a loud curse behind them from Hearts Boxcar, and both Droog and Spades froze in place. Karkat concentrated really hard and managed to roll his head back up so he could see them better. He thought vaguely that they looked slightly ridiculous, all still like statues and bug-eyed in shock.

“Say that again,” the leader of the Midnight Crew said harshly, addressing Terezi.

“The cops arrested Gamzee on suspicion of being the Ringmaster,” the girl said, steadily leveling her tone. “We came here to find his alibi and prove his innocence.”

Slowly, Spades dropped back into his seat. Droog leaned against the desk and lit a cigarillo, puffing on it thoughtfully.

“You know, if they had to come here for the alibi, then the kid probably hasn't flipped,” he said.

“I fucking know that,” Spades said, groaning.

“So what do you want to do?” his lieutenant asked. Spades scowled and swatted absently at him.

“I fucking hate owing people in the slammer,” he complained, fishing in the pocket of his trenchcoat and pulling out a cigarette. Droog held out his lighter and Spades lit the small white cylinder from it before taking a deep drag. He glared at Karkat.

“Seriously, what the fuck is wrong with that kid?” he asked. Karkat stared back at him, the distant shouting in his head a roaring thunder. There was something he should be saying, something he should be doing, what was it...?

“Fffuh,” he managed. Next to him, Terezi snickered.

“Sounds to me like you've managed to set off his submission reflex,” she said, and the angry voice in Karkat really didn't like that she had told them that.

 _You grubfucking nooksniffing shithive backstabbing BITCH!_ it screamed. Karkat did his best to express the sentiment with a hearty; “Fffuhguu.”

“His what?” Spades asked, oblivious to Karkat's impotent fury. Terezi shrugged.

“Submission reflex; it's an evolutionary response. Back on Alternia, our people used to rip horns from defeated foes. If you're limp and submissive there's a chance they'll take pity, and if they don't then being relaxed makes you less likely to die of shock and blood loss. I guess over hundreds of generations it became an involuntary reaction.”

“Wait,” Hearts rumbled. “So yer mean if I poked yer head here...”

“DON'T!” Droog and Spades both yelled at once, and the big man froze.

“You fucking moron!” Spades snapped. “What, are you trying to knock her stupid like the boy?”

“Oh, sorry, boss,” Hearts shuffled back out of Karkat's eye-line, looking abashed. Karkat made a muzzy little noise of protest over the nature of the conversation, and Spades sighed.

“So let me get this straight. Some dumbass troll kid who sometimes works for us has got himself pinched for whacking those people, and the reason he's got no fucking alibi is because he was out with us those nights.”

“Yeah, pretty much,” Droog agreed.

“And despite this, he hasn't ratted us out to the cops, leading his little friends here to come knocking on our fucking door looking for help.”

“That's how it seems.”

Spades growled. “And we have fucking proceeded to threaten to kill them, tied them to chairs, and apparently managed to knock this one completely fucking loopy- by accident, I am forced to add?”

“Indeed,” Droog stated, narrowing his eyes at the two captives. Spades tapped his fingers thoughtfully on the table as he stubbed out the remains of his cigarette on a knife-hole.

“You know, I fucking liked that troll kid,” he said abruptly. “Little fucker was sharp for a sopor-head, and cheap. Never fucking underestimate the value of cheap.”

“He dressed atrociously,” Droog supplied. Spades snorted.

“Yeah, so the fuck what? You're obsessed with clothes, asshole.” He got to his feet and gestured to the prisoners. “Watch them. They do anything dumb, shoot them.” So saying, he vanished out of Karkat's line of vision. A few seconds later he heard a door closing.

“Where's he going?” Terezi asked.

“None of your business,” Droog replied, lifting the end of his cigarillo back to his mouth and forestalling any further conversation. They waited in silence until a few minutes later, when the door behind them clicked again and Spades walked back into view carrying something bundled in clear plastic. He waited until he was back behind the desk to drop the object in front of them, and even through the fading endorphin haze Karkat could make out the wicked, curved blade of a knife, so long that it was more like a sword, blade and hilt both bright with multicolored stains.

“What is it?” Terezi asked.

“Rhuuuugh,” Karkat attempted, eyes still locked on the bloody weapon.

“It's evidence that'll clear your friend,” Spades said, unexpectedly gentle despite the native roughness of his voice. “Tell the cops where you got it. Leave out the part where the little fucker worked for us.”

Droog frowned. “Boss, are you sure...” he began dubiously.

Spades cut him off. “Fuck, Droog, we owe the kid this one. And besides, I learned fucking ages ago to never trust a junkie with a secret you don't want the cops or the Felt getting hold of. These two can't give up anything other than this hideout and the meet-point, and this hideout is a fucking shit-hole.”

“Yeah, but the heat...”

A knife thudded into the table just next to Droog's hand as Spades got to his feet and leaned forward, snarling. “I am the fucking leader, Diamonds, and I just fucking decided. You got something to say about that?”

Droog sneered right back. “Yeah. How we gonna clear out of here before the cops arrive?” he asked.

Spades chuckled. “Oh, that. That's fucking easy,” he said, walking around the desk to look down at Terezi. “Night night, kid.”

Long fingers reached out and tweaked the base of the blind girl's conical horns. Karkat watched helplessly as she slumped loosely in her chair, as useless as he was. Then those same sharp digits dug into his own scalp, washing away all traces of lucidity on a wave of sheer blissful calm.

They sat passively on the chairs as the Midnight Crew cleaned up around them, occasionally pausing to poke the two trolls back into submissive paralysis. The time passed in a fluid, dreamlike haze, Karkat barely even noting when the handcuffs were removed from his wrists and he and Terezi were dumped unceremoniously on the floor where the crates had previously been.

The last one to put them under was Hearts Boxcar, who paused before leaving and then gently arranged Karkat's arm to drape over Terezi's shoulder. Karkat tried to glare furiously at him, but the most he could manage was a sort of bleary stare before the mobster was gone. All traces of the hideout were cleaned down to bare walls and dust, the only thing remaining the knife in the plastic bag at their feet. After a long while, when he felt like maybe some of his motor control might be coming back, Karkat felt something wet on his neck and clumsily rolled his head to see Terezi licking at him.

“Whaa th' fuuh,” he grumbled, weakly trying to shove her off and discovering that she weighed more than he thought she did.

“Tasst guuh,” she mumbled back, before chuckling weakly. Karkat groaned and tried to roll away from her, succeeding in falling over and dragging her after him to lie face-to-face on the floor. She grinned widely and snaked her tongue out to lick between his eyes, dragging her disgusting slimy tongue down his cartilage nub to the scent-holes at the end and giggling weakly.

Karkat thought that if he ever saw Spades Slick again, killing him was not going to be payback enough.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to people who pointed out my vocab slips- that was really helpful! And guys, in future, if you see any fish puns I could have used and didn't, feel free to tell me. I'm not much use with them.
> 
> Again, thanks for reading and I adore you all.


	19. ==> Be The Restless Amateur Psychologist

### CHAPTER EIGHTEEN ==> Be The Restless Amateur Psychologist

Rose Lalonde was awakened from a somewhat fitful nap by an unusual commotion from the precinct office. Given the nature of the protests outside Derse Mansion and the increasingly hostile atmosphere in the city she and her compatriots had elected to stay close to the police station, picking up a change of clothes at a local thrift store- much to Eridan's dismay- and then alternating between a suite in a nearby hotel and the benches in the station's atrium. Dodging the media had been a chore, one made even more awkward by Jade's insistence that her new Alternian friends stay at the hotel with them. Thus far they had managed to avoid drawing notice from the reporters clustered at the front of the station by entering via the rear of the building, a plan that had only worked with the fully complicit assistance of the police department.

Detectives Sikes and Francisco had been remarkably understanding, Rose thought, as had their fellow officers. Nonetheless after only two days, the pattern was becoming remarkably stressful; even chatting to her friends on Pesterchum was not sufficient to relieve the boredom, and the fact that every single one of them had a stake in the events she was physically closest to made casual chatter awkward. From talking to Sollux and Feferi, Rose was convinced that the hacker was up to something underhanded, and both Dave and John skirted around the topic of what had happened to them with a forced joviality that made her all the more concerned. The only one who didn't badger her for answers was Kanaya, and she was too busy seeking reassurances of health and well-being to be good company.

Then there were the friends who were actually physically present. Rose knew intellectually that they were feeling the strain just as much as she was, but she still couldn't help making cutting remarks when Jade started acting like a six-year-old to try and impress Nepeta, or when Eridan snarled curt demands at the people who passed by. She honestly thought it was a fortunate happenstance that Equius seemed so happy to take the brunt of the seadweller's temper, but something about his subservience was making her own mood all the worse. Today they had been joined by a short, slightly bemused carer who gave his name as Warren Verhoeven before gifting Nepeta a small plush cat toy and joining her and Jade in constructing the imagined adventures of the newly christened “Lord Pounce”. Rose had eventually chosen to nap on the bench rather than continue with the inanity of her current existence.

As she sat up and stretched her arms over her head, however, she realized that the current situation was anything but inane. Her friends had all abandoned their own activities to cluster in the precinct office around two Alternians, one of whom she recognized as the boy who had been released on bail the previous day. The newcomers were leaning on Detective Sikes' desk and talking over each other in a frenzy, the boy waving about a clear plastic bag with a long, wicked knife in it as the human and his partner behind him bemusedly tried to quiet them down so they could understand what was being said.

It took Rose a second glance to work out that the bright colors she could see on the blade were bloodstains, but within moments she had risen and walked softly over to the desk, stepping in behind the youth. She knew better than to lay a hand on the shoulder of an unsuspecting Alternian, so instead she gently coughed to draw his attention. He whirled, red-tinted irises flashing with anger, and she granted him a polite smile that went nowhere near her eyes. From what she had been told he had attacked one of her friends and badly scared another, and as far as she was concerned that meant he should be locked safely away in a cell, but Feferi had pleaded for him on Sollux's behalf and that was that. It did not mean she had to like him in the least.

“Perhaps if one of you spoke at a time, you would communicate more clearly,” she pointed out to the two Alternians. The boy scowled.

“Oh, yeah? And who fucking asked you to stick your nose into our business, tert bitch?” He had a thick accent, Rose noted, little burrs and clicks heavily peppering his English. “You think I give a fuck about helping your incurable urge to be a nosy meddler? Why don't you go find some other asshole to go and pester, or is that beyond the meager reasoning capacity of your infinitesimal human think-pan?”

“Hey, leave her alone, you jerk!” Jade protested. “She's just trying to help; there's no need to be mean about it!”

“Yeah, show some fuckin' respect for your betters,” Eridan sneered. The other troll- Karkat, Rose recalled, that was what the detectives had called him- snorted derisively and made a gesture that Rose knew from Sollux to be obscene.

“Welcome to Earth, you fin-faced fuckass,” he said, a slight scornful twist to his lips as the strange girl beside him started to cackle madly. “If you've got a fucking problem with my blood, you take it up with the _law,_ asshole. Oh no, wait, you can't, because I've got the same fucking rights as you and all your grubfucking cull-happy hemospectrum freaks!”

Rose was about to intervene, when opposite her Equius looked up from cradling Nepeta and frowned in admonishment.

“Vantas, I must protest your excessively lewd language,” he said. Karkat's head snapped round and his glare deepened. Despite herself, Rose was impressed by the extent of his irascibility. She wondered precisely how deep his anger could run given sufficient provocation; it was probably the sign of some deep-seated insecurity, of course- she seemed to recall something about him being mutant-blooded, and his taunting of Eridan would seem to support that as a root cause. He would probably make for a fascinating study into the psychological repercussions of the culture surrounding the Alternian hemospectrum.

“Fuck you, Zahhak,” the red-blooded Alternian was saying, the fist that wasn't holding the bagged weapon flexing. “You think I don't know you and your autistic cave-girl were the ones who set the cops on us?”

Equius growled. “This is not Nepeta's fault,” he stated, a low rumble of his own anger behind the words. “She only did what she believed to be best...”

“Yeah, and she got Gamzee locked up!” Karkat yelled. “We were your fucking friends, you sweaty bulgebrained asshole, and you fucking threw us to the cavalreapers!”

Equius looked as if he was about to say something else, but before he could open his mouth there was a loud squeal and Nepeta detached herself from his waist to launch herself at Karkat. The short troll staggered backwards as her weight hit him in the chest, arms and legs wrapping around his torso as she buried her face in his shoulder.

“The powpurrful huntress is sorry she ever hurt Karkitty and Gamzee!” she wailed. “She was just so scared and it was clawful and purrlease furgive her!”

Karkat flailed, trying and failing to prize the green-blooded girl off. “Get off me, you crazy fucking... meowbeast! Shoo! Scat! For fuck's sake!” He groaned and rolled his eyes. “I forgive you, okay? I fucking forgive you! Now get off me!”

Nepeta pulled her head back up to look at him with wide, tearful eyes. “Do you really, Karkitty?” she asked, lip quivering.

“Yes! Now get the fuck down!”

“Say it purroperly,” Nepeta demanded, and there was a small mischievous smile tugging her lips upwards. Karkat scowled, but Rose noticed that his gaze flickered uncertainly to where Equius was standing. The blue-blood looked about as calm and cheerful as a thundercloud, and it occurred to Rose that maybe she should be slightly worried about the number of foul-tempered unhappy aliens with claws and excessive strength she was currently in close proximity to.

“Fine,” Karkat said, puffing crossly. “I furgive you.” Nepeta squealed with glee and he shoved at her again. “Now seriously, get the fuck off me before your moirail decides to break me in half!”

As Nepeta jumped down and scurried back to Equius' side, Detective Sikes leaned forward onto his desk. “Heartwarming as all this is, we'd still kinda like an explanation for the _bloodstained weapon_ you've got there. 'Rezi, I'm gonna go out on a limb and assume that you've got something prepared?”

The Alternian girl, who from her appearance and the fragment of her name Rose realized had to be Dave's friend Terezi, grinned broadly and stood to attention. “Detective, my fellow investigator and I would like to present you with this evidence!” she declared triumphantly, as her partner dumped the plastic bag unceremoniously on the desk. “We obtained it at great personal peril and...” she snickered slightly, and Karkat winced, “... sacrifice. It is our expectation that the new information we have obtained will exonerate Gamzee Makara and lead to the true culprit in the Ringmaster case being brought to justice!”

There was a moment of silence, then chaos broke out again. Rose sighed and found a nearby chair to sit on, pulling out her cellphone. Certain interested parties were going to want to hear about this.

-– tentacleTherapist [TT] began pestering turntechGodhead [TG] at 13:36 –-  
TT: Hello Dave. I hope I am not interrupting anything particularly important.

After a good few moments during which the racket continued unabated, her brother replied.

TG: hey rose  
TG: me and egbert were just watching some shitty films together  
TG: not con air thank god  
TG: but honestly i have never been so happy to be at risk of immanent analysis  
TG: i fucking swear to god if he sings along with one more shitty song  
TG: thats it  
TG: theyll have to cart me off to the funny farm  
TG: itll be a fucking tragedy rose  
TG: all the neighbors watching as they load me into the van  
TG: shaking their heads and going  
TG: man  
TG: and that kid had so much to look forward to  
TG: with his looks and his talent  
TG: such a fucking pity

Rose chuckled. Nearby, Detective Francisco was shouting over the noise to call for some order, and it seemed to be having at least some effect.

TT: Well, I have been saying for some time that you clearly have some issues that you would benefit from discussing more openly.  
TT: That will have to wait until another time, however.  
TT: There appear to be some developments unfolding pertaining to the Ringmaster case.

This time Dave wasn't slow to respond in the least.

TG: what sort of developments

Rose looked over to the now calm group by the desk.

TT: Give me a minute, I think there's about to be a more detailed explanation.

As it turned out there was indeed an explanation, which took several minutes and rapidly switched between Terezi and Karkat as they each tried to make their own version of the story clear. Weeding out the confused narrative that in Rose's opinion swung like a rather intoxicated pendulum from overly dramatic legalese to incoherently furious ranting, and allowing for the additional obfuscation caused by the interjections, objections and outright horrified interruptions provided by the audience, she managed to piece together a moderately clear picture of events. Looking back at her cellphone, she saw that Dave had not been idle in the time she had been listening.

TG: come on rose  
TG: youre leaving me hanging here  
TG: actually youre leaving both of us hanging since egderp decided to read over my shoulder  
TG: we're like low hanging fruit here  
TG: ripe for the plucking  
TG: hanging on your every word just like you know you always wanted  
TG: both of us at your mercy  
TG: rose  
TG: shit youre not even paying attention are you

Rose sighed.

TT: I was busy building an outline of events to share with you.  
TT: I assumed you would prefer something a little more substantial than my own wild speculations.

She paused to gather her thoughts, and a new message appeared.

TG: so spill already lalonde

Damnation. Rose began to tap her response.

TT: Well, as I understand it, your friend Terezi smelled something that made her doubt Gamzee's guilt.  
TT: She recruited Karkat after he was released on bail and they went searching for some sign of the Ringmaster.

Dave interrupted before she could continue.

TG: yeah that sounds like rezi  
TG: shes been wanting to do that ever since the fucker first hacked someone up

Rose made a mental note to spend some time talking to Terezi at a later date- it sounded as if she would make for a fascinating interview. For the moment, however, Rose returned to enlightening her twin.

TT: Well, for reasons which are unclear but which I strongly suspect have something to do with my adoptive brother and his current mysterious project, they ended up searching for clues in a particularly bad neighborhood.  
TT: It was at this point that they were captured by the Midnight Crew.

Not unexpectedly, this revelation caused her brother some alarm.

TG: wait what  
TG: oh fuck  
TG: is she okay??

Rose hastened to reassure him.

TT: They both appear to be unharmed. A little scuffed up, perhaps, but none the worse for their ordeal.  
TT: More importantly, the leader of the Midnight Crew gave them a knife in a bag.  
TT: They believe it to be the Ringmaster's weapon of choice, and are convinced that it will exonerate Gamzee.

There was a slight pause before Dave's reply, during which Rose watched the ongoing drama at the nearby desk. Detective Francisco had vanished along with the bloody knife; Detective Sikes, on the other hand, appeared to be talking to someone on the phone while periodically breaking off to argue with Terezi. Before Rose could gather what was going on, Pesterchum chimed again.

TG: okay seriously  
TG: there are so many things wrong with this picture  
TG: like why are they not dead  
TG: why the fuck would the crew give them the murder weapon  
TG: hell why would the crew even have the murder weapon

It was easy to forget sometimes, given his deliberately aggravating persona, that Dave was no fool.

TT: All valid questions. I am convinced that they are hiding something from the police.  
TT: But right now all further questions are on hold while the knife is rushed to the lab for analysis.  
TT: We should have initial results by late this evening.

Dave's next message was as swift as it was unexpected.

TG: okay thats it  
TG: were coming over there

Surprised, Rose hastened to reply to her brother.

TT: Really, there is no need.  
TT: There are already quite enough people in here, and I certainly wouldn't want to upset John.

She recalled clearly how deeply his aversion to harlequins ran; in fact, she had been the one who suggested he seek professional help for his phobia in the first place. In general he was far better with such imagery now, but the Ringmaster was very much in the archetype her friend had once dreaded. Rose wouldn't have blamed him for wanting to stay away.

TG: actually its his idea  
TG: he says he wants to see this through  
TG: face his fears kind of thing  
TG: so anyways im gonna go find bro  
TG: get him to give us a lift

Well. That was unexpected. Still, if John believed this to be somehow therapeutic, Rose was inclined to be supportive.

TT: Very well. I will expect you both soon.  
TT: Do tell Dirk to drive carefully, and Dave?

She paused, a small smile playing on her lips.

TG: yeah??

Rose wondered if what she was about to say was inappropriate given the tone of their conversation. Then again, a rare show of genuine sentiment was more than warranted on this occasion. Swallowing her uncertainty, she hastily typed the last line and signed off before Dave could mock her for it.

TT: Tell John I look forward to meeting him in person.  
–- tentacleTherapist [TT] ceased pestering turntechGodhead [TG] at 13:54 –-

Rose slipped her cellphone back in her pocket and pushed away from the chair, wandering back to where her friends and acquaintances were settled in the atrium once more.

“Jade,” she called. Her dark-haired friend looked up from what seemed to be some sort of negotiation between Nepeta and Karkat, and Rose strode up next to her. “Dave and John are on their way here.”

“Great, just what I fucking need,” Karkat grumbled, overhearing. “Dealing with that tert asshole's pathetic attempts at hostility would just fucking complete my day.”

Jade reached out and slapped his head. “Don't be rude about my friends!” she ordered. Rose raised an eyebrow.

“Much as I object to slander wrought upon my brother, however deserving, are you sure that violence is an appropriate response?”

“No, it's fine!” Jade told her cheerfully, ignoring the death-glare that Karkat shot at her. “I do it to Eridan all the time!”

“Yeah, and next time you try it I'm gonna fuckin' rip your arm off,” the seadweller piped up, sullenly slouched on the bench a few feet away.

“Are not,” Jade replied easily, sticking her tongue out at Eridan, who replied with a rude gesture. It was more than slightly amusing for Rose to observe how the hated restrictions placed on his mode of dress by shopping at the thrift store had resulted in a far more aesthetically pleasing ensemble. No wonder Kanaya despaired of the seadweller's fashion sense.

“Well, this is just fucking wonderful,” Karkat sighed, throwing himself down onto a seat. “I am surrounded by wigglers and the mentally retarded. If one of you fucktards left the room I'm fairly sure the collective intellect of everyone present would actually increase- I know for a fact that my own thinkpan is about one slimesucking moron away from dribbling out of my auricular sponge-holes and making a bid for freedom across the floor.”

Nepeta giggled and crawled across the bench to rest her face on Karkat's shoulder. “Aww, don't be a grumpy puss!” she said, beaming up at him. “I know you just want to be a purrlayful Karkitty really!”

Rose once again found herself impressed with Karkat, this time by the sheer dedicated force he put into smacking his own forehead.

For the next quarter of an hour, Rose found it more amenable to simply sit back and listen than to intervene in the unfolding conversation. It took her less than five minutes to comprehend that the small cat-troll had a flushed quadrant crush on Karkat; from the way she was clinging to him and attempting to monopolize his attention, there was little else it could be. Her large blue-blooded moirail seemed less than happy about this, but his rather heavy-handed attempts at intervention kept being derailed by Eridan's need to be the center of attention for at least one person. Then of course there was Terezi, who Rose was having trouble pinning down. She kept licking Karkat, ostensibly because he tasted nice, but Rose suspected that she was either flirting or attempting to antagonize him- which could, of course, also be flirting. But then she didn't seem to mind Nepeta's simultaneous advances, and Dave had mentioned that chewing his t-shirt was one of Terezi's favorite idle pastimes...

Jade came and settled in next to her, gently placing Lord Pounce on the nearest desk. “This is weird,” she said. Rose looked over at her friend.

“What do you mean?” she asked neutrally. Personally, she could think of a great many strange things about their present situation, but in her experience Jade was rarely perturbed by anything Rose would consider unusual.

Jade waved a hand at the knot of noisy, arguing Alternians. “I just... it sort of hit me how many people there are here.” She smiled shyly. “It's a good thing, of course, I love having so many people to make friends with! But, well...”

“You are used to being alone,” Rose finished for her. Jade sighed happily.

“Yeah,” she agreed. “I mean, you and Dave and John were my only friends for so long, and I never even met you! And even with Feferi and Eridan on the island, it's not too different, because they both spend so much time in the water or busy or hiding alone somewhere. But whenever we come out to the mainland it's like, there are people everywhere!” She giggled. “I don't know how you do it all the time!”

Rose smiled. “It certainly does require patience,” she agreed.

Jade beamed back and looked as if she was about to say something more, but before she could the street-side door burst open and a panicked-looking woman in a rumpled suit charged in. Before anyone could intercept her she caught sight of her quarry and, ignoring everyone else in the room, ran to grab Terezi into an enveloping hug.

“Oh my God, Terezi, what were you _thinking_?” she said, kissing the crown of the Alternian girl's head in a clear gesture of affection.

“... Hi, Cathy,” was the slightly muffled response. It still sounded as if Terezi was grinning, and when Cathy pulled back slightly Rose saw that her guess was correct. The human woman smoothed a hand over the gray girl's face protectively.

“Are you hurt? Injured anywhere?” she demanded.

“She's fine,” Detective Sikes said, walking over from the office. “A few scrapes and bruises but nothing serious.”

“As if I would fall victim to such unlawful individuals,” Terezi protested. Rose suspected that she wasn't nearly as incautious as she was choosing to sound, however reckless her actions might have seemed. She had learned from living with Sollux and Kanaya that sometimes the Alternian perception of an acceptable risk was a little skewed. That didn't mean they planned on dying.

Not that the woman Rose suspected of being Terezi's mother seemed to realize that. “Of all the reckless, irresponsible, _childish_...” she was yelling. Rose sighed and got to her feet. _Mothers_.

“Where are you going?” Jade was asking.

“Outside,” Rose told her, heading for the back door. “I could use some fresh air, away from all these ridiculous dramatics.”

To her surprise, Jade kept in step with her. “Okay,” she said happily. “I'll come with!”

Rose smiled, glad for the company. The pair of them wandered unremarked down a quiet corridor before exiting onto the bare concrete parking lot. Rose elected to sit on the raised step by the door while Jade started to do a silly little spinning dance, humming her own invented tune.

It was surprisingly relaxing to simply spend some time in the relative quiet of the parking lot, and as Rose took deep breaths of the admittedly polluted city air she considered that there had possibly been some aspect of cabin fever to her ill temperament of late. She leaned back against the wall of the building and watched Jade, thinking how lucky she was to have such good friends at her side, literally and metaphorically.

“Wow, Lalonde, I had no idea you were into that kinda show.”

Both girls looked around to the source of the amused drawl, and as a smile spread on Rose's face, Jade let out an immense squeal of delight.

“Daaaaaaaave!” she yelled, abandoning her dance to leap at him and throw her arms around his neck. “Oh my god, you're here! And...” she broke off and looked over at the dark-haired boy accompanying him, eyes wide. The moment stretched a little as Rose noted how similar the two of them looked; same protruding overbite, same round eyes- albeit in different colors- same wiry build and same mess of thick black hair.

“Hi, Jade,” said John, sticking out a hand. Gingerly Jade took it, and then a moment later they were hugging and laughing and even Dave had cracked a smile.

“Oh, man, I can't believe it took this long to meet you!” John exclaimed as they both pulled back. Jade nodded.

“I know, right?” she replied with a giggle. “I mean, we're twins and everything! Oh wow, you have a freckle in the same place I do!” She poked his face with one long finger and they both started laughing again. Rose decided that this made for a good time to get to her feet and casually stroll over. She nodded politely to her brother.

“Strider,” she acknowledged. He gave a her a small nod.

“'Sup, Lalonde.”

John looked over at her, eyes twinkling in the afternoon sunlight. “Oh, Rose! I'm so sorry, I just totally ignored you, didn't I?”

She couldn't help but smile. “It is perfectly alright, John. I understand.”

A moment later she was almost bowled off her feet by a ferocious tackle-hug. “Nuh-uh!” John said, giving her a gentle squeeze. He was surprisingly strong for such a skinny boy, and Rose reevaluated her assumption that Jade's own strength was purely a function of her unusual upbringing.

“You're like my sister too,” he said, and Rose couldn't stop her heart from jumping a little when he said it.

“Well, isn't that just fucking adorable,” said a familiar grouchy voice, sounding as if the owner thought just the opposite. “In fact, it's the most beautiful fucking romantic moment I ever saw. Now cut out the bizarre human pale polyamory before I die of fucking saccharine overdose or my blood-pusher explodes from sheer rage at how incompetent you all are in your shallow wading pool of alien feelings.”

Rose didn't even have to turn around to know who had just come out the back door. “Vantas,” she said, teeth gritted in frustration at the destroyer of her peace of mind.

Dave, it seemed, held a similar opinion of the Alternian- at least judging by the sneer forming on his face. “What's the matter, Karkles? You jealous?” He held his arms out wide. “C'mere, I'll give you a hug. One day you can tell all your little mutant grandbabies about how you got a brief taste of Strider swag before getting your ass thrown back out into the cold.” He paused for a moment of dramatic thought. “Of course, that's assuming anyone puts up with your shit long enough to actually breed with you.”

Karkat scowled. “Oh, shut up, fuckass. I am not in the mood for your shit today, okay?” He jabbed a thumb back over his shoulder. “I came out here to get away from fucking mindless jabbering, not to be subjected to more.”

“Hi Karkat!” John declared, waving as enthusiastically as if the Alternian hadn't fought his best friend then been arrested while he watched. Karkat responded with what Rose assumed to be a truly heartfelt middle finger.

“Yeah, well, you're not the only busy one, fucknuts,” Dave said. He turned to Rose, Jade and John. “You guys gonna be okay out here with him if I go in to check on 'Rezi?”

The three of them all nodded. “We should be absolutely fine,” Rose said. “Will you be coming back out, or shall we come in to join you after a suitable interval?”

Dave shrugged. “It's warm. May as well stick out here, right?” he suggested. “I'll come find you. Catch you later.” He held out a fist and with a short laugh, John bumped his own against it.

“Don't adopt the fucking troll, Egbert,” Dave warned, before turning to head past Karkat into the building.

“I won't!” John shouted after his retreating back. He grinned at the girls then virtually bounced over to the step where Karkat was now sitting moodily.

“Hey!” he said. “So I heard that your friend Gamzee isn't the Ringmaster after all?”

Karkat scowled. “No, he fucking isn't, and thanks for reminding me that my moirail is in prison until they finish processing that evidence. Asshole.”

Rose and Jade wandered up after their friend. “Come on, John,” Rose urged gently. “I think we would be best off leaving Karkat alone right now.”

“But he's my friend too!” John protested, looking utterly downcast. Karkat, by contrast, looked absolutely furious.

“I am not your fucking friend!” he yelled. “What the fuck is wrong with you? Were you dropped on your head as a grub? Is your thinkpan actually malformed? In what universe are we ever friends?”

John laughed. “Since you stayed over and we played video games and watched Kindergarten Cop together!”

“Yes, thank you so much for that. I don't think I will ever be able to fully block the memory of that piece of utter hoofbeast shit...” Karkat broke off, frown deepening as he stared over John's shoulder. “Hey, who the fuck is that?”

Rose heard footsteps and turned to see a flash of a figure in a black trenchcoat, something brightly colored at his neck, before everything suddenly and painfully went dark.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow. Lots of people at once is difficult. Please assume that the people who aren't talking "on screen" are chatting amongst themselves, or something, because this is like some sort of mad juggling act right here.
> 
> Approaching the final stretch now! We have four more chapters and an epilogue (which I will post along with the final chapter) so that's only a couple more weeks and then this story is no longer a WIP! :O


	20. ==> Be The Frantic Texan Coolkid

### CHAPTER NINETEEN ==> Be The Frantic Texan Coolkid

Dave Strider was looking at his worst nightmare, painted in dripping red on the wall of the police station parking lot and illuminated by fading California sunlight.

It said: _who's fucking laughing now?_

The dot of the question mark was a smiley face.

There was yellow police tape marking a large square around the wall and the back door, enclosing a white-clad army of forensics investigators and guarded by a second army of blue uniformed cops. The crime scene was literally on their own back doorstep, so there were no police cars actively hovering around the scene. The correct ambiance was instead provided by the ambulance Dave was leaning against, protectively not-quite-guarding as a paramedic taped a square bandage to the wound on Rose's forehead. Nearby Terezi stood with Cathy's arm around her shoulder, and Dave could vaguely hear the whining tone of Eridan's voice haranguing Captain Grazer a little further away while the two unfamiliar trolls- Nepeta and Equius- watched from by the corner of the building with their carer by their side.

The entire place was bustling with people, and yet remained stubbornly devoid of the three he most wanted to see. Dave was pretty sure that it was ironic, but not in any sort of good way.

“It was not your fault,” Rose told him, as the paramedic finished and stood up to give her some space. Dave's lips tightened infinitesimally, barely cracking his impassive mask. There was no point spending years perfecting the Strider poker face if you couldn't use it when shit started getting emotional.

“Sure,” he agreed. Rose snorted skeptically.

“If you had been here, I suspect that you would not have had the power to affect the outcome,” she pointed out with a calmness to rival his own. “As it was, our assailant successfully attacked four adolescents close to their full growth, one of whom was Alternian and able to see him coming. At this point I think we can rule out the idea that a fifth individual would have acted as protection or deterrent.” She gently pressed a hand to the injured side of her head, as if trying to squash out the pain. “In fact, your absence during the attack was if anything a beneficial circumstance, since it allowed you to return and raise the alarm before I regained consciousness.”

Dave rolled his eyes, not that she could see behind his aviators. “Great. I'm the fucking cavalry, that's me. I'm just gonna swing by at dawn on the third day, except by then everyone's been butchered by orcs and the whole world belongs to the crazy-ass dude in robes and his flaming eye buddy.” He paused and tilted his head to look down his nose at his sister. “And you'd better appreciate me choosing that metaphor to get all cosy with your wizard fetish,” he added.

Rose inclined her head in a slight nod. Someone other than Dave might have had trouble seeing the strain on her face- the Strider-Lalonde family were good at stoic, he supposed. “I do,” she conceded. “But you mustn't blame yourself. There was no reason to expect that anything like this would happen, for any of us.”

Dave shook his head. “I was supposed to keep John safe. And Jade... fuck. Jade.” He rubbed a hand distractedly through his hair. “And okay, Vantas was a real fucking jerk, but still... they're completely gone, Rose. There isn't even any fucking blood except for that sicko message, and we don't even know which one of them it came from!”

“Actually, we do,” said the voice of Detective Francisco. Dave looked towards the approaching man, who had left his partner at the edge of the crime scene to join them. He looked harried and about ten years older, and for a moment Dave saw the policeman slip to reveal his friend's father beneath, exhausted and worried.

“It's a fairly simple test to tell human from Alternian blood, and forensics just got back to us,” the man explained, waving a hand towards the white swathed investigators. “Normally we'd run more tests before reaching any conclusions, but since Karkat is the only member of his species we know of with that blood color it's pretty obviously his.”

Terezi leaned a little further into Cathy; Dave could have sworn he saw her skin turn a slightly paler shade of gray. “How badly hurt is he?” she asked, her normal cockiness all but entirely absent.

Detective Francisco shook his head. “Impossible to say,” he said. “There's no blood trail, but we're assuming this is the Ringmaster's work and he has always been good at covering his tracks. It could just be a shallow cut that bleeds a lot.”

“Or it could be a fucking lethal injury,” Dave said, filling in the space the cops words had left behind. “He could be spewing blood like Quentin Tarantino's directing, except there ain't some guy in the back of the theater to yell that it's only sugar syrup...”

Rose made a small cough of warning and Dave wisely decided to shut his mouth before any more crap fell out. Detective Francisco looked over to her.

“How are you doing?” he asked her, a professional edge to his tone that suggested more than casual interest.

Rose poked gently at the bandage on her head. “Well enough,” she said. “The paramedic says I seem to have been very lucky, although he would like to take me to the hospital for some scans to be sure. I have asked to stay here a little longer.”

Detective Francisco nodded in understanding. “If there is anything else you remember, that you can tell us...” his voice trailed off as Rose regarded him sadly.

“I will inform you at once,” she assured him. “But I saw very little. To be honest, I suspect had I witnessed more I would not have survived my encounter at all.”

“That is our thinking,” Detective Francisco confirmed, and a shiver ran down Dave's spine. He wasn't sure whether to be glad or not that Bro hadn't shown up yet; on the one hand, he really needed the support, but on the other he wasn't really sure what Striders were supposed to do in this kind of situation. Being cool and ironic didn't seem like the right approach when two of your best friends in the entire world were in the hands of a monster, but that was the only way Bro had ever taught him.

For the first time he could remember, Dave was at a loss for how to act.

He saw nearby movement and, glad to be distracted, looked across to see Detective Sikes coming up to join them, cellphone to his ear. “Yeah... no, I think here's better... look, get someone on it, willya?” He snapped the phone shut as he drew level with them and smiled in a way that had nothing to do with amusement. “Okay, I got news.”

“What news?” Terezi demanded, leaning closer to Matt. Dave, although just as eager for information, managed to play it cool. Barely. Not that anyone but Rose noticed, and she acknowledged it only with a slight quirk of a nod.

“That was the lab on the phone,” the leather-jacketed Detective was saying. “We got results on that weapon.”

“Already?” Detective Francisco said, surprised. “That was fast!”

Matt nodded, eyes lit oddly from within. “Oh, yeah. Turns out it's an unusual enough shape for them to confirm it as the Ringmaster's murder weapon pretty much right away, and although it'll take a while to sort out the mess on that thing we've been able to lift traces of Slick's DNA and prints from the bag and get it analyzed.”

Detective Francisco nodded. “Well, we expected that, but it hardly helps us now. The Midnight Crew tend to burn down any chance of recovering that kind of evidence from their crime scenes, so we can't use it to link him to his priors.”

“Yeah, but you aren't gonna believe where they did find a DNA match,” Matt said. Dave found himself wanting to shake the man; John and Jade were in danger, for fuck's sake, this wasn't some sort of shitty game where he could dick around for ages on side quests and still be on time to save the day!

“Where?” Detective Francisco asked mildly, as if completely unaware of Dave's impatience. Matt's mouth narrowed.

“The Ringmaster killings,” he said, and Dave would have asked if he was joking except he clearly wasn't.

“But... that makes no sense!” Terezi protested, echoing the thoughts that were running in confused circles through Dave's head. “Why would he give us the murder weapon? Why would he let us go?”

Matt shrugged. “I don't know, but if he isn't the guilty party he sure as hell knows who is, and that's good enough for me. It would explain how the guy always manages to vanish on us- nobody can disappear in this city like the Crew can.” He turned to his partner. “George, you remember that box Jade gave us?”

George raised his eyebrows sardonically. “You mean the one that was almost certainly a present from the Snowman?” he asked. Matt waved a hand dismissively in the air.

“Yeah, yeah, but you know as well as I do that trying to track the Midnight Crew is like trying to nail down smoke. That black-hearted bitch might be bad news, but she also might just have given us what we need to get a step ahead and actually catch the bastards!” He emphasized his words with a violent downwards slam of his hand, smacking it into his other palm with a loud slap. “Come on, George, whaddya say?”

Detective Francisco nodded grimly. “I've been wanting to arrest him for a long time,” he said.

“You and the entire rest of the department, buddy,” Matt replied. He turned to go then paused, turning back to address Cathy. “Oh, yeah. There's one other thing. Cathy, can you do me a favor?”

“That depends on what it is,” she replied, one arm still cradling Terezi protectively. Dave was glad the pair of them had worked out their differences, even if it had taken 'Rezi getting kidnapped to bring them to that point. He'd not really been thrown by the news of the Alternian's history, already suspecting something of the sort from a few off-hand comments he'd heard from Tav, 'Rezi and some other troll kids at school, but he guessed not everyone had found it so easy to process.

Matt shifted awkwardly. “Okay, see, given recent events we're pretty sure we know who the Ringmaster is and that he's at large...”

Cathy nodded patiently. Dave thought she had a poker face that Bro would be proud of.

“And we've actually got a full confession from Karkat regarding the attack on his foster father...”

Dave was starting to see what direction this was heading in. “No. No way,” he protested. “You've gotta be kidding.”

Matt shrugged sheepishly. “We've gotta let Gamzee go,” he said simply. “Child services will want to take him, of course, but since his moirail got kidnapped from right under our noses I pulled a few strings.”

“No. Absolutely no,” Dave insisted, turning to Cathy. “He's a crazy fucking asshole and I'm pretty sure he wants to kill me for sitting on Karkles the other day.”

Cathy ignored him to reply to Matt. “You want me to keep an eye on him,” she said.

“Yeah, well, I watched your kid for a couple days,” Matt pointed out. “It's just until we know...” he trailed off and Cathy leaned over to place a hand on his shoulder.

“Okay,” she said. Matt smiled and pulled his cell back out of his pocket as he started to head back towards the building, George giving them all a worried smile before following.

“Great,” Dave said. “More crazy around here. Just what we need.”

“I dunno, little man. He seemed decent enough underneath all that.”

Dave didn't jump or flinch from the voice close behind him as Rose and Terezi did. Instead he turned slowly, nonchalantly, as Bro strode around the side of the ambulance and walked up to stand just in front of him.

“Hey, Bro,” he said, deadpan as he could manage. His brother looked down at him for a moment through those blank anime shades, and then did the one thing Dave would never have expected. Bro hugged him.

Taken utterly by surprise, Dave offered no resistance. His mind raced, trying to calculate the correct response. Would returning the gesture be properly ironic, or was this a test passed by remaining unresponsive? Shit, he had no idea what Bro expected of him, and if he got it wrong he was going to be mocked for weeks.

His brother bent down to bring his mouth next to Dave's ear. “Quit over-thinking it, kid,” he whispered. “This is not the fucking time for irony.”

He could still be lying, but Dave decided to risk it. Cautiously he snaked his arms around Bro, until he was an active participant in what had to be the most awkward hug ever in the history of the human race. Neither of them quite knew what to do with their elbows and they were both kind of skinny so there was all this leftover arm to deal with and Dave was starting to wonder how people ever managed to do this sort of thing all the time, because it was weird and uncomfortable. Nonetheless Bro hung onto him for at least a minute, rocking gently on his heels and just, well, being there. When he let go Dave was happy to do likewise, but there was a slight sense of emptiness and loss. It vanished again a moment later when Bro draped an arm over his shoulders in imitation of how Cathy was holding 'Rezi, and Dave deigned to lean in a little closer as his brother gave a small salute to Rose.

“Salutations, sis,” the older Strider said. “Think your perfectly contained demeanor could stand gettin' a piece of this epic hug action?”

Rose smiled and got to her feet, unsteadily walking the few steps to stand by her brothers. “I wouldn't say no,” she admitted. “I do understand why Mom can't be here right now, but...”

“Yeah, I know,” Bro said, winding his free arm around her and tugging her close. “Check it out, we've got siblin' bondin' all up in this bitch.” He rocked his head sideways to gently brush a cheek against Rose's hair. “Missed you, li'l sis.”

Rose responded by wrapping an arm back around him- Dave wondered how much of that was genuine affection, and how much was to do with holding herself upright. She sighed and closed her eyes, leaning on Bro for support. “I will admit to having been disquieted by your absence also, Dirk.”

“That's Lalonde for _I missed you too_ ,” Dave translated. His brother snorted and gave both of them a squeeze.

“Yeah, believe it or not, I got that,” he said. There were a few moments of companionable silence, then his head turned and his grip slackened. “Heads up, we got company.”

Dave looked over to see a uniformed cop leading a familiar figure towards them. Gamzee looked hesitant, almost nervous, wearing worn gray sweat pants and a faded black T-shirt that had clearly been found for him not long ago. The policeman looked at them as he drew near, and focused in on Cathy.

“You the lady Detective Sikes asked me to leave him with?” he asked. Cathy nodded, and the policeman passed her a small pill jar with a child-proof lid.

“He gets one at mealtimes, if it comes up,” he said. “Supposed to be some other pills but we haven't had time to get the full prescription. Make sure he takes them, and keep an eye on him. If he goes missing Child Services will have our heads.”

Cathy glanced briefly at the container before slipping it in her pocket and reaching a hand out to Gamzee. “Hi there,” she said, smiling. “My name's Cathy. It's nice to meet you.”

Gamzee looked blankly at the hand. “Gamzee,” he said. He raised his head, and when the hair fell out of his eyes Dave saw that he looked absolutely furious. “Now is someone gonna up and give me a straight motherfucking answer about what the fuck happened to my palebro?”

There was a brief awkward silence, then Rose cleared her throat. “I am sorry to say that we know relatively little,” she told him. “He was attacked along with myself and my friends John and Jade, and appears to have been abducted along with them by the Ringmaster. We know he's injured, but not how badly.”

Gamzee growled and clenched his fists. “MotherFUCK!” he yelled. Across the parking lot, Dave saw Nepeta and Equius' heads snap around; closer by, Terezi ducked away from Cathy's arm and stepped up to the tall troll. She tilted her head up so he could see her face, then she smacked him hard on the nose.

None of them moved, too shocked to respond as Gamzee raised a single astonished hand to his face. Terezi didn't relent, jabbing a sharp finger into his bony ribs before he could back up.

“Stop that,” she ordered. “Karkat risked his life helping me get the evidence to clear you. He didn't do that so you could let him down now, when he needs you to be strong for him!”

Gamzee stared at her, slowly blinking, then to Dave's amazement a wide grin split his face.

“He... he motherfucking believed me?” he asked. Terezi nodded, her own face stern and even a little solemn.

“Yes, he did,” she said. “And he might not say it but I know he needs you. So you are required to get your head out of your ass and start assisting!”

Gamzee fidgeted. “But I don't know nothing,” he pointed out. “I wanna be there for Karbro, but I dunno how I can be getting my help on, unless a sister's got a motherfucking plan?” His voice raised hopefully, and Terezi started to slowly smile.

“It seems,” she said thoughtfully, rolling the words in her mouth as she spoke, “that the police would like to locate Spades Slick, as he either is the Ringmaster or else knows where to find him.”

Dave could see the anger flash through Gamzee; it was obvious in the way his fists clenched and his lips pulled back from his teeth, just for a second. But then it vanished, buried and transformed into an almost gleefully vicious excitement that lit up the indigo-blood's angular face. Right then, Dave wouldn't have made a bet on Slick emerging alive from an encounter with the young troll. Then again, if that asshole had taken John and Jade, he wouldn't want him to anyway.

“Fuck, I can be all helping in finding that motherfucker!” Gamzee said, eyes widening in unholy delight. Terezi nodded as if she had expected that exact response, and tugged on Cathy's arm.

“Come on, let's go find Matt!” she said, and as the woman started to move the troll girl grabbed Gamzee with her free hand and started towing them both towards the police station. Dave watched them go, mildly bemused, and decided it was long since time to move out of his brother's sheltering grip. He did so, and as Rose followed suit and stumbled Dave caught her fall. He led her over to the ambulance again and let her lean on him as she sat, Bro following to sit on her other side.

“Well, that was interesting,” Rose mused. Bro nodded in thoughtful agreement.

“Yeah,” he agreed. “That kid's done work for the Crew, hasn't he?”

“So I would surmise,” Rose agreed. Dave blinked, surprise thankfully hidden by his sunglasses. Oh. That made all kinds of sense out of a lot of things, actually. He joined his siblings in gazing out over the crime scene. The view was interrupted when a wide-eyed gray face framed by a blue fleece hat appeared around the edge of the ambulance, followed a moment later by a set of more chiseled features gleaming with a layer of blueish sweat. Dave nodded to the two trolls, then flinched backwards as Nepeta crawled practically up into his lap.

“Personal space, kitty,” he said, scrambling backwards into the ambulance. Two large hands grabbed the tiny troll girl around the waist and bodily lifted her backwards, Equius setting her effortlessly atop his broad shoulders.

“Fuck,” said Bro. It was hard to tell through his shades, but Dave thought he might be staring. “You are one muscular dude, ain't you? Is that all just for show or do you actually have the strength to go with it?”

Equius inclined his head slightly. “Yes. I am extremely strong,” he said. “I apologize for our intrusion, but we saw you with the Highblood a moment ago...”

“Gamzee has gone inside with Terezi to assist the police,” Rose informed them. “Did you want to speak to him?”

Equius glanced at Nepeta, who looked at them sidelong from behind her moirail's head. “... possibly,” he said. Dave sensed that there was something going on he hadn't heard about in the brief introduction he'd had to the pair, and Bro clearly got the same message because he stood up and waved to his vacated seat.

“You may as well wait with us,” he offered. “Mi casa es su casa, or some shit like that.”

Equius definitely winced at the swear word, but he deposited Nepeta next to Rose nonetheless, choosing to stand between her and the rest of the world like he was a bodyguard. He and Bro shifted around each other a little before arriving at some sort of honor guard positioning, one on each side of the ambulance. Dave studied the huge troll and wondered how he had got his broken horn.

Awkward silence returned, the five of them uncomfortable talking about what had transpired but not really up to inconsequential small talk. Dave amused himself as the sky darkened by watching Eridan chase the police around the parking lot, haranguing them. He seemed as annoyed as hell but whatever. Everyone had to deal in their own way, and according to Rose he did actually seem to like Jade. Or at least, not completely hate her. Terezi had once told him that emotions like friendship started to get more strange and confused the higher you got on the hemospectrum. Dave had told her that friendship wasn't an emotion and she was talking out of her ass, and she had cackled, but now he thought he could see what she meant. From what he was yelling, Eridan seemed to view Jade as a pain in the ass that somehow belonged to him. Her disappearance was more than abduction; it was theft of his own personal property.

Dave pretty much decided that Eridan was a douchebag. And an idiot. He considered making a crappy seadweller troll character for his shitty webcomic; the guy was certainly ridiculous enough for Sweet Bro and Hella Jeff. Caught in his thoughts, he didn't really know how much later it was that Terezi, Cathy and Gamzee appeared from the building and started towards them. It felt like maybe a thousand years, an age of the world, something like that. It was probably more like half an hour or so- long enough for the sun to go down and the floodlights to be brought out, at any rate. The returning group looked fairly pleased with themselves, which Dave took as a positive sign.

The accomplished look on Gamzee's face faded when he saw Equius and Nepeta waiting. Dave thought he actually tried to stop, or maybe turn back, but Terezi didn't loosen her grip on his arm. His hesitation became a momentary pause before he stumbled after her, eyes flicking from the muscular blue-blood to the cat-girl green-blood and back again. As he got close, Dave realized that Gamzee was actually taller than Equius, although by no means as bulky; somehow in his head he had pictured the indigo-blood as the shorter of the two.

Eventually Gamzee was standing right in front of Equius, twisting his fingers in the fabric of his t-shirt and leaving small holes in it with his claws. The silence became a shade or two more awkward; Dave considered saying something flippant to break it, but it was like Bro had said earlier. This did not feel like the fucking time for irony.

“Highblood,” Equius said carefully. Gamzee stared fixedly at the ground, a hunched, slouching shadow back-lit by the brilliant white artificial light at the crime scene.

“I don't never want to motherfucking cull you,” he muttered. On the other side of Rose, Nepeta was crouched ready on her heels. As he spoke, she hissed at the tall young troll. Gamzee flinched.

“I didn't motherfucking mean it!” he yelled, as if by reflex. “I didn't, I didn't, I just couldn't fucking not!” He shook his head violently. “'S a miracle,” he added, quiet again. “Motherfucking... I... shit.”

Equius folded his arms, a picture of immovable resolve. “That is not sufficient,” he said coldly. Gamzee nodded as if his head was a lead weight on a floppy spring, and accidentally tore a gash in his shirt when his hand slipped.

“What I gotta do?” he asked softly. “You just up and motherfucking tell me and I'll listen, I promise I'll be all listening to those miracles.” He raised his eyes, looked at Equius and smiled nervously. “I'm real motherfucking good at listening.”

“Say you're sorry!” Nepeta blurted, at the same moment as Equius demanded; “Convince me it will never happen again.”

Gamzee looked between the two of them and nodded, more carefully this time. “I got these meds,” he said absently, face turned to Equius. “And they make all the shit up in my thinkpan be all quiet like a miracle, like what the sopor all used to motherfucking do except I'm not all rotting my own self up no more. So I can't say I ain't got some righteous harshwhimsy all kicking back up there, but so long as I got my miracle pills I ain't packing no murdervoodoo subjugglations, and that's a motherfucking promise to every brother and sister what ever gets near me.”

He shifted until he was looking straight at Nepeta. “And I am sorry,” he said, more firmly, although something liquid and purple was spilling out of his eyes and sparkling in the floodlights. “I am so motherfucking sorry shit ain't even real. You're my strongest bro and my sweet li'l kitty sis and what I done, it ain't motherfucking right. It ain't right by you and it ain't right by me and it ain't miracles, not even a little bit.” He rubbed the tears off his face with a bare wrist and smiled wryly. “And I'm all thanking the messiahs every motherfucking day for my miracle bro, because he motherfucking up and saved you from me, and I ain't even... there ain't even motherfucking words.” He glanced back at Equius. “So... is that shit all up and good with us, now? We cool?”

Equius shook his head. “No. We are not _cool_.” As Gamzee's face fell, the blue-blood reached out and very carefully laid a hand on his shoulder. “But for my part, I am convinced that you do not present a threat to us, and one day I believe I will be able to forgive you. Nepeta?”

The cat-girl pouted and flopped into a sitting posture. “The purroud huntress is moved by the show of contrition from her old furend,” she said in a tone of voice that sounded more suspicious than emotional. “She thinks that everyone will be safer now he is out of the dark furorest where the monsters are.” She narrowed her eyes. “But she will not trust her old furend just yet, beclaws he is secretly a were-howlbeast, and although he doesn't want to hurt her he still might when the moons are full.”

Gamzee nodded solemnly and took a couple steps back to stand next to Terezi, looking at the troll girl for guidance. She grinned widely.

“So, thanks to our assistance, the task force is even now mobilizing to capture Spades Slick and his nefarious co-conspirators!” She tilted her head and looked around the assembled group. “Who wants to go see?”

“Terezi!” Cathy scolded, face snapping into an immediate frown. “Absolutely not!”

The blind troll turned to her mother, all innocence. “But Cathy, I promise to be careful! Isn't it good for me to witness human justice?”

Cathy folded her arms. “Not when it is likely to involve gunfire.”

Dave glanced over at Bro and raised a quizzical eyebrow. His brother gave a slight nod, and the pair of them turned to Rose. She laid a finger gently on her head injury and shook her head slightly. Nepeta and Equius, observing these interactions, shared a glance. The cat-girl grinned and winked at Dave, while her large moirail cleared his throat politely.

“If I might interrupt,” he said in a low rumble that would have interrupted whether the listeners wanted him to or not, “I believe that under the circumstances, it would be best if Terezi were to stick with those friends of hers that are present.”

Terezi and Cathy both looked at him perplexed. Equius simply folded his arms and looked blankly back. Gamzee glanced between them in confusion, and Dave belatedly realized that whether he liked him or not the indigo-blood probably had more right to join their half-assed expedition than anyone else. He looked over at Bro, pointedly, and to his credit his guardian got the hint.

“Hey, Cathy, I think we could all use some dinner out here. I know a takeaway place, if I can borrow your car.”

Cathy looked thoughtful, then dug the keys out of her pocket and tossed them to Bro. “Nothing with seafood for me.”

Bro saluted and got to his feet. “Come on Dave, you can help... and actually, do you mind if I borrow 'Rezi and Gamzee, too?” Cathy's eyes narrowed, and he shrugged helplessly. “I've got a lot of people to carry for. You're not gonna make me hoist all that food alone, are you?”

With a wave of her hand, the woman gave permission, and her two charges scampered after Bro and Dave as they made their way to Cathy's car. As he settled into the passenger seat, Dave whistled.

“I can't fucking believe you got away with that,” he said. Bro fixed him with a blank stare.

“C'mon, li'l dude, don't you know I'm a responsible guardian who would never, ever get you kids in any sort of trouble?” He shook his head as he stuck the keys in the ignition. “But we haven't got long. If she works out what I just pulled she is gonna sic the cops on our asses, and I will never be able to chaperone your field trips again.”

Terezi cackled. “Yesss!” she hissed, grabbing for her seatbelt.

Gamzee's smile crept across his face as the situation sunk into his sopor-rotted skull. “We gonna go see some motherfucking justice?” he asked eagerly.

Bro adjusted the rear-view mirror and nodded. “Hell yeah,” he said. “And then we're stopping for pizza.”

The police had a head start on them, but Bro as usual drove like a maniac as soon as they were out of sight of Cathy. Dave watched the city flash by, shadows and streetlights flashing in the darkness, and let himself worry about John.

His smartphone beeped in his pocket, and he pulled it out to see an invite from Terezi to join a Pesterchum memo board. He looked behind him to where his friend sat, cackling and licking her own cell.

“Justice Awaits?” he asked, looking at the memo title. Terezi nodded.

“So we can keep everyone in the loop,” she explained. Dave considered; it was a pretty good idea. He took the opportunity to type a few lines to let Rose know they were okay and en route. She responded to let him know that Cathy was worrying already, but not yet unduly.

“I can hear the sirens,” Terezi said suddenly, and both Dave and Gamzee perked up, trying to hear the police cars. Soon they didn't have to- they could see them, bright flashes of red and blue surrounding an old building at the end of the street. Bro pulled up onto the sidewalk a fair distance back and with the press of a button locked all the doors. Gamzee tugged at the handle of his and scowled, but Bro shook his head.

“Sorry, dude. Not gonna be safe out there.”

Gamzee looked like he was about to object, when the loud crack and boom of gunfire echoed from the police siege. Dave fought the urge to duck down- they were well out of range for anything but a sniper rifle, and that really wasn't the Crew's style. Instead he sat and watched as lights flashed in the night, and the city echoed with repeated shots. Terezi leaned over the back of his seat and demanded more information, so Dave did his best to describe what he could see. Mostly it was just shadows, shifting and darting about in front of the bright floodlights.

Then the sound of the gunfight died down and there was silence. The still door of the building flew open and armored police marched out, a thin figure in a trench coat struggling between them. As the cheer went up Dave exhaled softly. The relief lasted exactly as long as it took the SWAT team to drag all four members of the Midnight Crew to the waiting van. He watched the door, waiting to see them; two derpy, dark-haired faces, and one gray nubby-horned asshole.

Instead, the floodlight switched off, leaving him sitting numbly in the dark. It was Gamzee who spoke, voicing the sobering thought that all four of them shared.

“If they ain't all in there, where the motherfuck are our friends at?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So it was pointed out to me that when you order Homestuck fanfics by word count, this one is seventh largest as of last chapter.
> 
> HOLY HELL!
> 
> I knew I wrote a lot of words, but... woah. There are THOUSANDS of these things, and I've written one of the longest? What the fuck? And there's not even any smut. Is it even LEGAL for smutless fanfic to be on the first page of any kind of sorting?
> 
> The only conclusion I can reach is that everyone else isn't writing enough. :)


	21. ==> Be The Kidnapped Adventurous Smartypants

### CHAPTER TWENTY ==> Be The Kidnapped Adventurous Smartypants

Jade Harley woke with a splitting pain in her head and immediately chose to keep her eyes closed. Breathing slowly and letting her muscles stay limp to feign unconsciousness, she let her other senses tell her about her surroundings.

Her skin told her that she was lying on rough fabric, not thick enough to keep the chill of the hard, bumpy floor from reaching her. The air was still and cold, but apart from that nothing else touched her- so she wasn't tied up or restrained. There was a sense of warmth radiating by her head- another person was right next to her, close enough for her to feel their body heat.

Her nose smelled musty dampness in the air, not dissimilar from what she had found in caves before. She was probably underground, then; most likely a basement or cellar. She also picked up hints of smoke and gunpowder from the cloth by her face, and a metallic undertone in the air that she couldn't identify.

Her ears were most informative, despite not hearing much. That alone told her that she was somewhere either isolated or soundproof; if she couldn't hear the city, there was little point calling out for help or screaming, as only her captor would come running. What she could hear were two other people breathing nearby. The one she had felt next to her was breathing quietly but brokenly, small sobs choking back as if they were afraid to be heard. The other was further away, but was breathing raggedly as if every inhalation was an effort. She heard a faint clink of metal from the same direction and decided that it was probably safe to open her eyes and sit up.

She had seen the faint glow of a light on the other side of her eyelids and expected dimness; enough of her life had been spent exploring ruins and caves to adjust fast to the pale light of the electric lantern in the middle of the basement floor. It illuminated John beside her, curled up into a small fetal ball, and Karkat chained to the wall opposite by one wrist. His free hand was pressed to his side, and although it was dark and sparkling in the poor light there was no mistaking the small pool of blood spreading on the ground beside him.

“Nice of you to join us, Harley,” he said, voice rougher and accented heavily with the strain. If Jade hadn't lived with two Alternians for so long, she might not have understood him at all. She looked over at John, who hadn't even acknowledged her presence, and laid a gentle hand on his shoulder. Her twin flinched.

“He's been flipping the fuck out since he woke up,” Karkat said dully. “Dunno why.” His eyes slowly closed then snapped open again. “Fuck. Don't... don't let me pass out.”

“I won't,” Jade promised. “I'll just keep talking to you, okay? Or actually, why don't you talk to me? That might work better.” She crawled over the threadbare blanket she had been lying on to sit in front of John. “Hey, it's me, silly,” she told him. He didn't look up, but he didn't twitch back when she touched his shoulder again either. Looked like she was making some progress!

“So I've been trying to figure out why we're not fucking dead,” Karkat said thickly, as if he was talking through syrup. “And I have concluded that trying to work out the motivations of alien psychopaths is completely fucking impossible and I can't believe Past Me wasted so much fucking time on it.”

Jade glanced back at him. “Did he do that to you?” she asked. Karkat glared.

“No, I just got so fucking bored down here that I decided to stab myself on a particularly sharp pebble. Of course he fucking did it to me! I'm guessing that _he_ is the Ringmaster, since his hobbies apparantly include painting a rainbow of fucking troll blood on the fucking walls...”

John whimpered and pulled into himself a little further. Jade wrapped her arms around him and made what she hoped were reassuring noises. “It's okay,” she whispered to her brother. “Shh, it's okay.”

“You're utterly fucking pathetic,” Karkat mumbled. “The pair of you. Fucking... fucking pathetic.”

Jade turned her head to frown at him. “Look, I know you're kind of bleeding a lot and you probably aren't quite thinking straight right now, but there's no call to be rude to us! I mean, you look way more pathetic than we do anyway!”

Karkat laughed, a weak little barking noise that turned into a cough partway through. “I'm always fucking rude, Harley. I am a miserable bad-tempered fuckass and all the fucking joy in my life comes from telling everyone else what fucking humungous nooksniffing morons they all are. And I am not ever pathetic.”

“You are too completely pathetic, although you are also totally right about being a fuckass,” Jade told him. Karkat tried to laugh again.

“Yeah, curse of my titanic intellect,” he said, shifting against the wall. “I'm too smart for you bulgebrains. And you are the fucking pathetic one, Harley. It's you. Fucking fact, law of physics, so fuck you.”

Jade snorted. “Really imaginative. You're just so witty!”

“Hey, let's see you do any fucking better when you're trying to keep your innards on the inside,” Karkat protested quietly, leaning his head back and closing his eyes. Jade scrambled away from John across the bare room to slap the troll hard in the face. He jolted back to wakefulness and snarled at her, so she smacked him again for good measure.

“Don't fall asleep, fuckass,” she ordered. Karkat blinked and shook his head.

“Fuck,” he muttered. “Thanks, Harley.”

“Don't thank me yet,” she replied absently, checking his face and noting worriedly that his focus was still fuzzy. It was just going to get harder to keep him conscious; he needed to go to a hospital, but that didn't really seem like an option. Jade came to a decision.

“Move your hand,” she ordered, grabbing the edge of his hoodie and pulling it up.

“Fuck, no!” Karkat protested, struggling to pull away. “I'll fucking bleed to death, moron!”

Jade scowled and grabbed his wrist with her free hand, tugging it out the way so she could finish lifting his clothes and get a clear look at the injury. “I know first aid, stupid.” Even if Grandpa hadn't been so adamant about her learning it, she would likely have picked the skill up anyway. No sensible explorer was ever without basic medical training- you might as well leave your gun at home, or not have six methods of communication on your person at all times! Not that Jade was currently equipped in her customary fashion, or their situation would have been far less dire.

On the surface the wound was fairly small, but as she prodded at it she just had time to see that it ran deep before Karkat hissed and batted her hand away, leaving claw-marks on the skin. She glared at him and he glared back, pushing his hand into his side to staunch the steady drip of blood.

“I can't fix it if I can't see it, fuckass,” Jade said.

“You can't fucking fix it anyway,” Karkat snapped. “Unless you're hiding a load of medical supplies in your fucking _nook_.”

Jade sighed and pulled his red-stained hoodie back down, tugging gently at his wrist to let him know when to raise his hand. “Just... keep putting pressure on it,” she said.

Karkat rolled his eyes. “Yeah, I'll get right on that,” he said sarcastically. “It's only what I was fucking doing anyway before you decided to fucking poke me.”

Jade spared him one last glare before crawling back over to her brother.

“Come on, John,” she pleaded. “Please, I know it's scary, but you're braver than this.” A brainwave struck. “You're like that actor, um, Nicholas Cage! And you're, erm, you're the ex-con with a heart of gold and this is it, John, this is the plane full of villainous adversaries and, well, I guess that I'm the bunny? Or maybe Karkat is? But whatever, you've got to be tough and save the day now!”

There was a faint rustle as John's head turned slightly, and Jade beamed at the bright blue eye that stared at her from behind tear-stained glasses.

“Welcome back!” she said. John slowly unfolded, revealing a face that was red and shiny with crying and hair that was even more messed up than usual. He reached out and half-fell onto Jade, hugging her tight.

“Sorry,” he said quietly as Jade squeezed him back.

“Don't be silly,” she said. “You were scared, which is totally normal for a situation like this.”

“Yeah, the only reason Harley's so calm is because she's a fucking freak,” Karkat interjected. Jade turned to look at him.

“Oh yeah?” she demanded, half angry and half aware that she had to keep the Alternian boy talking. “What's your excuse?”

Karkat grinned with shaky triumph. “I'm in fucking shock, genius. I've got so many panic hormones in my thinkpan right now I have gone through scared and out the other fucking side. I am the zen fucking master of soiling myself in terror, got it?”

John giggled feebly before Jade could answer, turning his head to look across the room at where Karkat was chained. “Heh. I'm glad you guys are here.”

Karkat glared at him. “What a fucking lovely sentiment. I'm so glad that I'm here to die horribly in a basement with you too, you rotpanned fucking bulgescum.”

John shook a little in Jade's arms, but sounded more like himself as he said. “Oh, gosh! I didn't mean it that way! Honestly, I didn't!”

“I know that, nookstain.” Karkat leaned back against the wall, then seemed to think better of it and jolted forwards again. “I just don't fucking care. You could have been glad to be sharing this shithole with me earlier, you know. When I was screaming at you to snap the fuck out of it because I was freaking the fuck out over here?”

John pulled away from Jade's hug, although as he sat back he grabbed her hand. Jade squeezed it reassuringly and her brother returned the gesture. John glanced over at the plain concrete stairs that led up to a heavy metal door.

“Did either of you see him properly?” he asked quietly.

“Not really?” Jade said uncertainly, thinking back to the panicked moments of the assault in the parking lot. “I mean, I'm sure I saw him, but I don't really remember. It was all sort of fast.” She shuddered, remembering how the attack had started. “I hope Rose is okay.”

“I don't think he hung around,” Karkat said hoarsely. “Except for using me as a fucking paint set, but last I remember your friend was breathing at least.”

“So did you get a good look?” John asked, a strange edge on his voice. Karkat frowned.

“... maybe,” he said. “Why the fuck do you care, anyway?”

John shivered. “I don't know. It's just... in the parking lot, after he hit me, I think I saw him, ah.” The boy paused to swallow nervously. “I kind of saw what he did to you, and there was something. I don't know. It's stupid.”

Jade reached out and rubbed a hand across his back. “It's okay, John.”

Her brother sighed. “I just felt kind of like I was having one of my nightmares.”

“The clown ones?” Jade asked, and John nodded. “Well, I guess that makes sense, if he's the Ringmaster. I mean, it was a pretty nasty phobia.”

John nodded. “Yeah.” Then he seemed to brighten as he turned to Karkat. “So, what did you see?”

Karkat shrugged awkwardly, then hissed in pain as the movement jarred his wound. “Look, never fucking mind,” he said. “It's probably nothing anyway.”

“What's nothing?” Jade asked, suddenly intrigued. Karkat scowled.

“This is fucking embarrassing,” he muttered. “But- ah, fuck. This is going to sound fucking awful, but you've got to get it in your thinkpans. You all look the fucking same, okay?”

John and Jade shared a look. “What, you mean, humans?” John asked. Karkat snarled.

“Yes, humans! You don't have horns or symbols and your eyes are fucking tiny, okay? Until the other day I didn't exactly have much to do with you and basically, I tell you assholes apart by your ridiculous facial furniture and your hair and skin color, which is fucking weird I might add. What kind of dumbfuck species has different colored hair and skin?”

“What kind of fuckass species has different colored blood?” Jade responded quickly, stung a little by the thought that Karkat couldn't tell her from any other girl with long dark hair and glasses. The troll growled.

“Look, I'm not a complete moron. I can tell a human apart if I spend enough fucking time around them. Just, in general, I'm not a fucking genius with strangers.”

“Okay,” John agreed. “I mean, I'm pretty bad with faces too sometimes, and I guess if you didn't have those candy-corn horns then I'd pretty much confuse you with a load of other trolls, at least until you started talking!”

“There a fucking point in there somewhere, Egbert?”

John nodded thoughtfully. “Well, I'm sort of wondering why it's relevant.”

Karkat sighed. “Because I think that the Ri... the guy who dragged us off looks like some other human I saw. But I'm not certain. They could both just have the same fucking hair.”

“Who...” John began, but just then there was a click above them and the inner handle on the door began to turn. Suddenly Jade's heart was pounding and she realized that Karkat was wrong, she was afraid after all. Her hand gripped John's all the harder, and the returning pressure was actually painful. Karkat's eyes had gone wide and he seemed to be trying to burrow back into the wall; Jade kind of wanted to go over to him, but she was too scared to move and John seemed just as frozen. She watched as the door swung outwards and a figure stepped out onto the top of the steps.

He was tall, and human; his skin was pale enough to be slightly bluish, an impression enhanced by the dark shadows under his eyes and his dusty black clothes. He wore a bright scarf around his neck, a scrap of a child's patchwork blanket stained with time and wear. His hair was a black, greasy mess that stuck up around his face and there was stubble on his chin. In the center of it all gleamed two near-luminous points of green that burned with a terrifying intensity. He was hugging a large white carrier bag to his body, balancing it with one arm while he pulled the door closed behind him.

It occurred to Jade that she and John might be able to overpower him. It also occurred to her that if they tried and failed, there was no way to predict what the man would do in response.

He walked slowly down the steps and over to where John and Jade were sat side-by-side; as he drew closer, John started backing up towards the wall and Jade followed after him, until they were both pressed against the chill stone. The Ringmaster didn't seem in the least put out, following them to the wall before crouching down less than two feet away, the carrier bag lowered gently to the ground beside him. Jade watched nervously, hanging onto John for all she was worth as the serial killer reached into the bag.

He pulled out a teddy bear, and with great solemnity put it down in front of John. Moments later a toy rabbit followed and was presented to Jade. Then he rocked back onto his heels and watched them expectantly.

Slowly, carefully, Jade reached out and picked up the rabbit with her free hand. Both it and the bear were a fluffy pale brown, with such similar faces that they had to have been from the same original design. They both had a little bow; the bear's was blue and round its neck, and the rabbit's was green and fastened to an ear like a hair-ribbon. Jade stared at the toy and it smiled blankly up at her, glassy eyes slightly manic in their perfect roundness.

John didn't move, and after a few moments the Ringmaster scowled and grabbed the bear up, thrusting it insistently towards the boy. Grabbing it was probably a reflex; John seemed confused to even be holding it at all, but their captor seemed pleased. He grabbed the carrier bag and balled it up, slumping down from his heels to sit opposite the two teenagers.

“Brave bunny,” he said, and Jade nearly jumped out of her skin. His voice sounded strange, hoarse and cracked and bizarrely dreamy. “Baby bear.” A wide grin split his features and he giggled madly. Jade felt John pull a little closer to her, and she squeezed his hand again. She had no idea what was happening here, but it was bizarrely benign and more disconcerting than anything she had imagined.

A thin, grimy hand with claw-like nails reached out to brush her cheek, and she shuddered as the Ringmaster smiled brightly at her.

“Just the same,” he whispered, and Jade sensed that he wasn't quite talking to her. “Everything just the same, safe from the filthy lights, burning it out and it's her fault, brave bunny. It's all her fault for laughing.”

“Whose fault?” John asked suddenly, urgently, eyes snapping from the bear to the madman. “Who was laughing?”

The serial killer let out several high-pitched barks which could have been amusement and stared at his cracked black boots as he spoke. “Bella, Bella, can you hear him?” he asked, same unnatural grin on his face. His eyes flicked up to meet John's face. “No need to worry about her, baby bear. She can't know we're here. This place is hidden, and we're going to make it safe. Safe and secret.” He twisted his head around, neck bending almost impossibly as he looked back over his shoulder at Karkat.

“Going to make a message,” he cackled, limbs shifting as he turned and stalked on all fours towards the captive Alternian. Karkat scrambled to move further back as the Ringmaster drew close, noses almost touching as the murderer reached under his long coat and pulled out a small switchblade. It was a far cry from the long, almost sword-like knife Jade had seen at the police station, but the killer seemed perfectly comfortable with it in his hand.

To Jade's astonishment, Karkat managed to stay still and silent as the Ringmaster slowly drew the blade down one gray cheek. It must have been sharp, because the bright sparkle of blood followed from the invisible cut a few seconds later. Their captor reached up with his free hand and brushed his fingertips to the line of red, staining them scarlet and showing them to the wide-eyed Alternian.

“Red,” he whispered reverently. “Perfect red. Sent me a blessing, sent me a gift, just as the portent promised.” He leaned forwards and planted a gentle kiss on the forehead of the shaking boy. “You'll keep her away for me, won't you? Keep us safe and secret from her spies.”

“Sure,” Karkat said hoarsely. “Sure, whatever you say, I'll keep you safe. But you've got to untie me. I can't protect you if I'm chained to the fucking wall...”

The Ringmaster's hand lashed out, smashed violently across Karkat's face. Jade flinched back and John gasped softly as a small trail of blood appeared on Karkat's lip.

“DON'T SWEAR!” the Ringmaster roared, grabbing Karkat's throat and shoving him against the wall, bringing the knife to hover by his captive's eye with the other hand. “DON'T YOU EVER USE THAT LANGUAGE IN FRONT OF THEM! DON'T YOU EVER!”

“S...s...sorry,” Karkat managed to choke out, and the Ringmaster dropped him. The knife vanished away as the Alternian coughed and choked and pressed his free hand back down over the bleeding wound in his side. The Ringmaster studied him thoughtfully, his anger of the moment before vanished like summer mist. A lone finger reached out to trail along Karkat's jaw.

“So much beautiful blood,” he muttered. “But not enough, not enough, Bella.” He smiled wolfishly at Karkat. “I'm going to open you up,” he said, running a finger down the center of Karkat's chest. “Make the message while you sing. And brave bunny can have your heart, and baby bear your eyes.” He tilted his head thoughtfully. “Or does bear want the heart, and bunny the eyes? I can never remember.”

He straightened and stood upright, turning to smile dementedly at John and Jade. “It's dinner time,” he said. “We can eat together, and then we can chase her off. She'll be so angry, but we're not scared. No, nothing to be scared of any more.” Humming happily to himself, he wandered back up the steps and let himself out of the basement, slipping the key back into his pocket before the door had quite clicked closed behind him.

There was a long silence as three pairs of frightened eyes watched the door. After half a minute or so, Jade broke her stare and darted across the room, grabbing Karkat's chained wrist and tugging it closer to her face. She was expecting a protest, but there was none, and after a moment she realized she could hear him whispering.

“ _Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck..._ ”

“John, come and help me!” she whispered to her brother, who looked dazedly away from the door.

“Huh?” he said, confused.

Jade glared and wished she hadn't dropped the rabbit so she could throw it at her twin. “Weren't you listening? He's going to come back and he's going to kill Karkat, and I think he wants us to help him!”

John turned a pale greenish color. “Oh. Oh, god.” He started shaking. “We have to get out of here.”

“I know that!” Jade snapped, waving Karkat's chained arm at him. “So come and help me get him off this wall!”

“... no,” Karkat whispered. Jade glared down at him, and he met her gaze with his own stubborn glower.

“It'll take you far too long to get this fucking thing off, if your pathetic human think-pans are even capable of it,” he snarled. “Not to mention I'm half-dead as it is. Just focus on getting yourselves the fuck out of here. You... you should be able to knock the door into him next time he arrives. Give you a few moments to run, at least. It's a shitty plan but it stands a miniscule fucking chance of working.”

“So we'll get you loose and bring you with us,” Jade insisted, fiddling with the manacle again. She found the lock and frowned. Okay, it couldn't be that difficult to pick. She just had to figure this out.

Karkat coughed again and his manacled hand tightened into a fist before loosening again. “No, fuck, you're not listening. This idea is barely likely to work anyway and I'll just fucking slow you down. If you try and take me along you'll just get yourselves fucking culled and I'm going to die either way, okay?”

“No,” said John firmly, and Jade looked over in surprise as he crawled up to her side and smiled tightly at Karkat. “It's not okay. We're not leaving you here to get torn to pieces by that... that monster. We're going to save you.”

“You're a fucking idiot,” Karkat groaned, slumping back against the wall. “Fucking human fucking rotpanned fucking idiots fucking fuck _fuck_ fuck.”

“Here, let me see that,” John said, reaching out and taking the Alternian's wrist out of Jade's grip. “Huh.” He looked around the room, then suddenly stared at Jade. “Um.”

“What?” she asked, ignoring the stream of quiet obscenity coming from Karkat. John bit his lip.

“Well, I think I can pick the lock, but I need something long and thin and metal, and there's only one thing I can think of, and I kind of need mine to see what I'm doing...”

Suddenly Jade realized what he was staring at. “Oh!” she squeaked, and snatched the glasses off her face to hold them out to him. Things were pretty blurry without them, but she could still see shapes and colors and it was so, so much better than leaving Karkat behind. She could see her brother bend the frame in his hands and heard the cracks as he snapped off the two arms. He passed her back the lenses, smudged and a little bent but still intact. She held them to her face one-handed as John examined the shackle.

“Okay, hold it steady,” he said, slipping one of the broken arms into the lock. Jade watched him, teeth sticking out from under his teeth in concentration, and focused on keeping Karkat's arm still. It wasn't easy; whether from fear or blood loss or both, the Alternian was shaking.

“Stay with us, okay Karkat?” she said to him, putting on the brightest smile she could summon. Karkat glared blearily at the two of them.

“Does that fucking idiot even know what he's doing?”

John laughed. “Oh yeah! I figured it out for this one time I wanted to get into my Dad's study for a prank. See, I had these jumping snakes...”

“John!” Jade hissed, nodding pointedly at Karkat's wrist. With a small start, John went back to poking at the lock, the second arm of Jade's glasses sliding in to nudge the tumblers into place. Time passed in tense silence, Jade's arm starting to ache with the effort of holding even the slight weight of Karkat's chained hand steady. From the sweat on John's forehead, she thought that he was probably feeling just as much pressure. Karkat was back to labored breathing and holding his side, reddish eyes fixed on the small movements of John's hands.

_Click._

The manacle fell open. Karkat's hand dropped. All three of them looked at each other in tired amazement, and then John started to laugh. Without quite knowing why, Jade snorted, a grin spreading across her face as Karkat glared at them both.

“What the fuck is wrong with you two?” he growled, hauling himself upright with his freed hand on the wall for support. “We're still locked in the fucking room, you stupid nookstains.” He took a shaky step towards the stairs, stumbled, and started to fall to the ground only to be caught halfway by John.

“Whoa!” the human boy said, grinning. “Watch it! Like this.” He lifted Karkat's arm and slipped it around his shoulder, helping the alien boy limp up the steps to the door. Jade followed and followed their gaze to the narrow modern lock on the door handle.

“Can you pick it?” she asked her brother. He shook his head.

“We're going to have to use Karkat's plan,” he said thoughtfully. “Here, if you take him, I'll shove the door...”

“We're going to have to move faster than that,” Jade argued, stowing her lenses in a pocket. “What if I hold him on one side and you take the other, and we both shove with our free hands?”

“This is fucking ridiculous in every conceivable fashion,” Karkat grumbled as his other arm was lifted around Jade's shoulder and her hand pressed into the wound in his side. “I just want to make it clear that somewhere, far away from this miserable shit-hole of a planet, a stoned subjugglator is hallucinating this exact scenario and fucking laughing at us.”

“Oh, stop complaining, fuckass,” Jade told him, squinting at the blurry door. The three of them stared at it silently for a few minutes. Jade was starting to wonder if maybe they should sit down to wait, or at least let Karkat rest, when there was a faint click and the handle started to turn.

“NOW!” John yelled, and all three of them surged forwards, Jade letting go of her friend's injury to ram the door with all her strength at the same moment as John. Between them, Karkat yelled something that was definitely not English and somehow pivoted to forcefully kick the door with both legs at once. It slammed outwards with a loud crash and clatter and a howl of pain. They didn't wait to see how effective the tactic had been- before Karkat's legs had even hit the ground they were off, running down the corridor away from their captor.

Jade was half-blind and Karkat was focused on trying to keep up, so John led the way, tugging them through the first door they came to. It led into a small room, empty except for a few boxes and a table and a door in the opposite wall. Jade could hear footfalls behind them as John dragged them through the room, and she glanced back just in time to see the Ringmaster, his nose flattened and leaking blood, glare back at her. With a squeak of fear she slammed the door they had just run through and stumbled after her friends.

There was no time for argument or discussion as they turned another corner, raced down another corridor. It looked like they were in some sort of abandoned apartment block, but without knowing the layout that wasn't much help. John kicked open another door and suddenly they were in a tall, narrow stairwell and the only way to go was up.

They heard a door slam behind them and that was enough to get them racing upwards, Karkat stumbling and tripping until Jade and John grabbed his legs and started to carry him. By the third floor Jade was breathing as heavily as the injured Alternian, her lungs burning cold and painful, and she could still hear feet racing behind them.

Suddenly John dropped Karkat, the sudden weight causing both Jade and her passenger to stumble. She looked over at her brother and he pointed a fuzzy arm upwards.

“Keep going,” he whispered and she wanted to argue, wanted to tell him she wasn't leaving him, but there wasn't time so instead she wrapped her suddenly free arm around Karkat's waist and kept dragging him up. Behind her she heard a loud thump and a clatter, and her eyes blurred with tears as she pounded up the stairs. Panic gripped her as rapid footsteps gave chase, and then turned to relief as John slipped in beside them and grabbed Karkat's arm again. She wanted to ask, but John was still running so instead she worked on getting the three of them up and away.

The sound of nearby footsteps was starting to echo up the stairwell again just as they burst out onto the roof of the building, a flat wasteland of air conditioner vents and forgotten scaffolding. It was night, stars blocked out by the thick light pollution of the city as John dragged them across the open ground and down behind one of the huge metal boxes. The three of them slumped against the surface.

“What...” Jade asked as she panted for breath. John waved a hand and swallowed.

“Copied Karkat,” he gasped, chest heaving. “Kicked him down the stairs!”

Jade peeked around the side of the AC unit just in time to see the outline of the bloodied Ringmaster emerging from the stairwell. She pulled straight back. “He's on the roof,” she whispered. John bit his lip nervously and hefted Karkat again. The Alternian leaned heavily against the human boy, nearly unconscious as Jade took his other arm. With a nod they were moving, John guiding them into the maze of poles and boxes and plywood that covered the abandoned roof as Jade wondered just how long the three of them could hide before the Ringmaster found them.  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> EDIT 20/10/2012  
> A wild fanart appeared!
> 
> It can be found on the other end of this [elegant and finely-crafted link](http://fc00.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/189/9/6/home_is_where_the_heart_is__karkat_by_korallrahu-d56f9qy.png), courtesy of [korallrahu](http://korallrahu.deviantart.com/) [(Tumblr)](http://youweremyridehome.tumblr.com/).


	22. ==> Be The Distressed Psionic Hacker

### CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE ==> Be The Distressed Psionic Hacker

Sollux Captor glared at his computer screen, as if the sheer force of his impotent annoyance could reach through the ether and change what he was seeing. In the interview room, Spades Slick was leaning back on his chair as comfortable as if he was in his own hideout. He had turned down a lawyer, and in the time Sollux had been watching he had managed to proudly confess to seven different crimes, all of them violent and unpleasant. And yet there were two things he consistently denied.

“Why the fuck would I want to do that?” the mobster was demanding, waving a hand in angry fits around his head. “I fucking have nothing against trolls. Well, nothing fucking special, anyway. Why the fuck would I waste time killing them for fucking free?”

Detective Sikes pointed again to the file on the table. “Your DNA is at the crime scenes, Slick. On the bodies of the victims.”

The criminal snorted. “The fuck it is,” he replied. “You need to fucking fire your forensics department, you fucking jackass, because if you want proof I didn't do shit you just gotta check the murder weapon. I never touched that fucking thing and the prints will prove it.”

Detective Francisco leaned across the table. “And yet you had it on hand to give to Miss Pyrope and Mr Vantas.”

Spades Slick gave them both the finger. “Never said I didn't fucking OWN it, did I? Fucking pigs.”

“Things will go far better for you if you tell us the location of John Egbert, Jade Harley, and Karkat Vantas,” Detective Francisco said warningly. Spades folded his arms and growled.

“I didn't fucking snatch them,” he said, enunciating each word carefully. “I have no fucking clue where they are.” He leaned forwards onto the table and glared at the two cops. “Fuck, I was trying to help the little gray goat-eater out- why would I fucking follow him back here then kidnap him, huh?”

The policemen started to argue something else, but Sollux reached out and flicked the volume off in disgust. It was becoming more apparent by the second that Spades either didn't know or wasn't telling, and every moment they spent interviewing him was another moment where Karkat was in danger. Sollux sighed and rubbed his eyes tiredly. Everyone else in the house had gone to sleep hours ago. Feferi had come in to try and convince him to rest, but he had brushed her off. He was too wired to sleep anyway.

As he was reaching out to turn the sound back on, Pesterchum chimed. Sollux looked over at his other screen to see a message from Rose flashing.

TT: Sollux, are you currently available to render some assistance to a friend in need?

Sollux glared, even though she couldn't see it. Not more wordy Lalonde bullshit. He did not have the patience at the moment.

TA: ii dont have tiime two play your miind game2 lalonde  
TA: iim bu2y here

He turned back to monitor the police interrogation, expecting he had chased his human sister off. To his surprise, Pesterchum alerted him to a new message only moments later.

TT: The friend I was referring to was Karkat, although I have no small interest in John and Jade's wellbeing.

With a sigh, Sollux resigned himself to having to talk to her.

TA: already on iit  
TA: iive been watching the iinterview2  
TA: and iit2 no fucking good  
TA: 2pade2 2liick ii2 a dead fucking end

He paused as the frustration bubbled out of him. He didn't want to vent at Rose- actually no, he did, but he didn't have the luxury. Not that his adoptive human sister seemed to realize how valuable his time was right now.

TT: We are aware of that. That is why we need your help.  
TT: Here.  
tentacleTherapist [TT] sent twinArmageddons [TA] an invitation to memo on board JUST1C3 4W41TS!!!

Sollux stared at the memo invitation. His first instinct was to ignore it and go back to what he had been doing. Except what he had been doing was watch Spades Slick give the cops the runaround, which wasn't going to help anyone. He could recognize Terezi's typing quirk on that memo title. Maybe she and Rose had a better idea. Maybe they could help him rescue Karkat sooner.

He glanced back at the silent screen and saw Spades waving his arms, Detective Sikes on his feet and probably yelling right back. Dead end. Sollux closed his eyes and remembered Aradia, silently sleeping in the next room. This world was supposed to be safe. It was supposed to be better. He wasn't supposed to find people only to lose them again.

Gritting his teeth in preparation for the complete lake of musclebeast shit that almost certainly awaited him, Sollux clicked the Pesterchum link.

twinArmageddons [TA] responded to memo  
TA: okay  
TA: why am ii here  
GC: FOR JUST1C3 OBV1OUSLY >:]  
CT: D --> You are the lowb100d Sollux Captor?  
TA: ii have better thiing2 two do than 2iit here and be iin2ulted by 2tranger2  
CT: D --> I apologize for my f001ish language  
CT: D --> E%cruciating as it is to admit, you are the Helmsman, and as such deserving of my respect  
CT: D --> According to the principles of spiritual merit Sifu Leung has taught me, you are e%tremely STRONG  
TA: okay that2 iit iim out of here  
AC: :33 *ac pounces on the newcomer before he can leave and asks him to purrlease wait!*  
AC: :33 *ac mewls that we need his help to find karkitty!*  
TA: and as ii told ro2e iim working on iit already  
CA: told you he wwas gonna be a bitch about it  
TA: fuck you eriidan  
CA: mind outta the gutter sol wwe got wwork to do  
CA: although if you wanna cyber later ivve got some time  
TG: okay i am not being party to this any longer  
TG: seriously what is wrong with all you fucking trolls  
TG: youre wasting time like its going out of fashion round here  
TG: like kate moss wouldnt even touch that shit  
TG: got thrown out last season  
TC: LOOK who's TALKING motherfucker  
TC: wasting ALL those WORDS when WE should BE finding MY miracle MOIRAIL  
TA: wiill 2omeone ju2t tell me what the fuck ii2 goiing on here  
GC: W3 R34L1Z3D TH4T SL1CK C4NNOT H4V3 B33N TH3 R1NGM4ST3R 4S H3 L4CK3D OPPORTUN1TY  
GC: ON TH3 N1GHTS OF TH3 CR1M3S G4MZ33 S4W H1M 3NG4G3D 1N OTH3R CR1M1N4L 4CT1V1T13S  
GC: Y3T TH3 3V1D3NC3 FROM TH3 CR1M3 SC3N3S CL34RLY PO1NTS TO H1M >:[  
TA: ii know that much from watching the iinterview2  
TC: BUT that AIN'T all WE got HERE bro.  
TC: see WE was ALL getting OUR talk ON about THIS mystery SHIT,  
TC: AND rose WAS all UP and TELLING us ABOUT this MIRACLE what HUMANS got  
TC: where MOST times THEY have ONE wiggler AT a TIME,  
TC: BUT sometimes THERE'S two OF the LITTLE motherfuckers  
TC: and SOMETIMES the PAIR of THEM are ALL up AND motherfuckin IDENTICAL!  
TA: ...  
TA: are you 2hiitiing me  
TT: I assure you it is the truth.  
TT: This type of twin would be genetically identical, but thanks to the inevitable differences in their development from conception onwards, would have distinctly differing fingerprints.  
TT: And of course, given the confusion of the Ringmaster's crime scenes, there are scarcely any fingerprints for comparison save those on the currently under analysis murder weapon.  
TT: This highlights a potential flaw in our current reliance on DNA evidence to link Spades Slick to the Ringmaster's crimes.  
TA: 2o you thiink that 2liick ha2 a twiin and he2 the riingma2ter?  
TT: It is possible, but identical twins are extremely rare. That is why we need your help.  
GC: W3 W4NT YOU TO CH3CK TH3 R3CORDS FOR 4 B1RTH C3RT1F1C4T3 >;]  
TA: guess ii miight a2 well  
TA: not a2 iif ii wa2 gettiing anywhere wiith thii2 2hiit

It was the work of moments to close down the video feed and start burrowing into the government records. When they had first arrived it had been a shock and an irritation to find that humans wanted everyone to be documented; Sollux remembered losing his patience quickly with interminable interviews and paperwork whose purpose seemed to have mostly been to make him officially exist. Now he was thanking that same stupid fucking anal record-keeping. And modernization, of course. If they hadn't been so keen on getting everything computerized, there was no way he could have gone back far enough to look for someone Slick's age. Unfortunately, his rapid search of the birth certificates quickly hit a snag. 

TA: okay ii checked and there ii2n't anyone called 2pade2 2liick iin the2e2 record2 at all  
TG: well of course there fucking isnt  
TG: what kind of parent would name their kid spades  
TG: and then he makes friends with some other assholes  
TG: who just happen to be called diamonds clubs and hearts  
TG: yeah thats real likely and believable in every single way  
TG: its a fucking false name dumbass  
TA: well iim 2orry iim not an expert in your 2tupiid human namiing cu2tom2  
TA: oh wait no iim not  
TA: fuck you all  
TA: how the fuck am ii 2uppo2ed to fiind a biirth certiifiicate wiithout a name a22hole  
GC: DO TH3 POL1C3 NOT H4V3 1T?  
TA: eviidently not  
TC: THINK i MIGHT have GOT my REMEMBER on ABOUT something  
TC: pretty SURE this ONE time I heard ONE of THEM other MOTHERFUCKERS on the CREW  
TC: CALLING him NOIR or SOME shit LIKE that  
TC: he WAS pretty MOTHERFUCKIN pissed OFF  
TA: okay iill try that

Grumbling to himself, Sollux entered the new name and waited for it to come back useless. To his surprise, however, the records threw up a small list of results. He scrolled down, ignoring the first few as too old, until he found a couple around the right date and clicked them open.

Then he stared dumbly at the scanned images of the birth certificates. No way.

TA: ...  
TA: no fuckiing way  
CT: D --> What have you discovered?  
TA: you are not goiing to beliieve thii2  
TA: ii dont fuckiing beliieve thi2 and iim lookiing riight at iit  
TT: Sollux, please.  
TT: I must insist that however perturbing or apparently unbelievable your findings may seem, you share them with us.  
TT: It does not seem fit of us to resort to prevarication in the face of our friends' peril.  
TA: okay  
TA: youre riight  
TA: ii found iit  
TA: two biirth certiificate2 for human male2 named noir with the 2ame date and parent2  
TA: one of them ii2 called jack  
GC: 4ND? >:?  
TA: the other one ii2 called becquerel  
TT: ...  
TG: no fucking way  
TT: ...  
CT: D --> I do not understand the importance of this name  
CT: D --> Please e%plain  
TC: WHAT you MOTHERFUCKERS all UP and TALKING about?  
TT: ...  
TG: its not possible  
TG: i know you dont know much about our human naming customs but that is not a normal name  
TG: always thought it was a fucking weird thing for a kid to come up with actually  
TG: but what the hell i live with a guy who fills the house with smuppets  
TG: each to their freaky own  
TG: but this is too fucking much  
AC: :33 *ac tilts her head and mewls in puzzlement at the purrplexing statements*  
CA: its her dog  
CA: becquerel is the name of jade harleys fuckin monster dog  
TT: Not only that. It was previously the name of a stuffed rabbit toy she had owned since before her adoption.  
TT: In fact, it is safe to say she has been affectionately naming things Becquerel since she was old enough to speak.  
TA: okay iim goiing two check 2omethiing el2e  
TC: wait UP one MOTHERFUCKING moment HERE  
TC: YOU tellin ME johnbro AND jadesis ARE all UP and BEING adopted?  
TG: yeah try to keep up  
TG: what do you need subtitles for the tragically crazy and retarded or something  
TA: 2hiit ii found iit  
TA: two more biirth certiifiicate2 for december fiir2t 1995  
TA: twins john and jade parents becquerel noir and bella crocker  
TT: Is there anything else you can find out? Anything at all?  
TA: hang on  
CA: no fuckin wway  
CA: no wway am i believin that jades dad ancestor is that fuckin psycho killer  
CA: howw am i supposed ta evven process that its fuckin inconceivvable  
TG: oh fucking hell  
TG: john was always scared of clowns  
TG: always  
TA: okay 2o iive got a death certiifiicate for bella crocker  
TA: dated 1997  
TA: and from what iim 2eeiing becquerel was put on trial for killing her  
TA: only it 2ays here 2omethiing about hiim not beiing guiilty on the ground2 of beiing nut2  
GC: NOT GU1LTY BY R34SON OF 1NS4N1TY  
GC: 1F TH4T W4S TH3 V3RD1CT H3 WOULD H4V3 B33N COMM1TT3D  
GC: H3 MUST H4V3 B33N R3L34S3D >:[  
TG: hes got spades fucking slick for a twin brother  
TG: he could have been busted out  
TT: Either way Jade is a public figure. He could easily have seen her on the television.  
TT: Perhaps he recognized her, or possibly he merely found her features reminiscent of his lost child.  
TT: Or- and I am loathe to make this mental connection given the potential repercussions- his lover.  
TG: thanks for that image rose  
TG: now i have to go scrub my brain  
AC: :(( *ac pawses then mewls for attention to remind efuryone*  
AC: :(( *we still don't know how to find them!*  
CA: actually i might havve an idea  
TC: well don't be shy fishy bro  
TC: TIME TO MOTHERFUCKING SHARE  
TG: time to take our motherfucking meds if you ask me  
TG: where the fuck did you run off to with bros cellphone anyway  
TG: for that matter when the fuck did you learn to type in fucking english  
TG: wait  
TG: is bro there with you??  
TC: honk honk :o)  
CT: D --> Highb100d, Dave human, I must politely re%est that you remain c001headed  
TG: dude im always cool  
CT: D --> Nonetheless  
CT: D --> I believe the seadweller was telling us his idea  
CA: yeah wwell the thing is  
CA: if this guy is so fuckin nuts someone musta been helpin him  
CA: and my bet is on slick  
TG: you always this fucking brilliant??  
TT: Oh, invariably.  
CA: shut up you dont evven knoww wwhat im sayin yet  
CA: and wwould it kill you to show some fuckin gratitude  
CA: helpin you outta the goodness a my heart  
TT: Cease equivocating and perhaps we will.  
TT: Continue and I assure you we will only become progressively less sympathetic.  
CA: okay fine wwhatevver  
CA: wwhat wwe need is someone who can find the crewws hideouts  
CA: and i knoww just the fuckin person  
CA: gimme a moment here  
caligulasAquarium [CA] sent arachnidsGrip [AG] an invitation to memo on board JUST1C3 4W41TS!!!  
TA: oh fuck no  
CT: D --> Vriska?  
arachnidsGrip [AG] responded to memo  
AG: Hellooooooo everyone!!!!!!!!  
AG: It's so very nice to 8e here. ::::)  
TA: fuck off and diie  
AG: Do I know you????????  
CT: D --> That is what I would like to know  
GC: 4FT3R WH4T YOU D1D TO H1S M4T3SPR1T YOU SHOULD >:[  
AG: Terezi Pyrope!!!!!!!!  
AG: It's del8tful to see you again. ;;;;D  
GC: 1M W4TCH1NG YOU S3RK3T. CLOS3LY. 4ND 1 DONT N33D 3Y3S TO DO 1T.  
AG: Geez, I'm here to h8lp you know!!!!!!!!  
AG: You should trust your old friends a little more, Pyrope. ::::)  
TT: Forgive me for interrupting your suspicious posturing, but I must remind you that three close friends of ours are in mortal danger and time is of the essence.  
TT: If this individual can help us then I believe we should be listening to them.  
TA: you dont under2tand ro2e  
TA: thii2 ii2 her  
TA: 2he2 the one who made  
TA: who made me  
TA: ii cant even fucking 2ay iit  
GC: TH3N 1 W1LL  
GC: SH3 TR13D TO K1LL H1S M4T3SPR1T OV3R 4 GRUDG3  
GC: 4ND SH3 US3D H1S BODY 4ND H1S POW3RS TO DO 1T  
GC: W3 C4NNOT TRUST H3R  
CT: D --> That does sound like Vriska  
AG: W8, that was you? The rustblood bitch's little psionic quadrant????????  
AG: Don't tell me you're stiiiiiiiill mad about that old stuff!!!!!!!!  
AG: I mean, we were just little kids b8ck then. You can't even have been proper m8sprits. ::::)  
TA: 2HE2 BEEN IIN A COMA FOR THREE 2WEEP2 YOU EVIIL BIITCH  
CT: D --> Oh dear  
CA: wwhoa wwait up  
CA: you tellin me vvris wwas the one wwho fuckin hurt your sleepin beauty  
TA: ye2  
TG: no offense or anything but who fucking cares right now  
TG: in case youve forgotten john and jade are in mortal fucking danger from their psycho pops  
TG: and the little grey asshole needs us too i guess  
TC: his NAME is KARKAT  
TT: Dave is correct. We desperately need help, no matter how unreliable the source.  
TT: Although I will confess to being somewhat frantic with worry.  
AG: Look, I promise I'm here to h8lp. ::::D  
AG: My mother h8s the Ringmaster almost as much as the cops do. Maaaaaaaaybe more- he's b8d for business.  
TA: fiine  
AG: I'm soooooooorry, wh8t did you s8????????  
TA: ii 2aiid you can fuckiing help okay  
TA: but iif you try anythiing explodiing computer2 wiill be the lea2t of your worriie2  
AG: Oh, so that was yoooooooou, was it?  
AG: I knew Pyrope had h8lp. >::::(  
CA: for fucks sake vvris just spill already  
AG: Oh, fiiiiiiiine. Be that way!  
AG: Here.  
arachnidsGrip [AG] sent file TopSecr8tLoot01.png at 03:22  
AG: You'd better appreci8 that because it was for one of my special pl8ts!!!!!!!!  
TG: what the fuck is it??  
AG: A map of all the Midnight Crew hideouts with markers for usage.  
AG: I would guess you're looking for one of the disused ones. ::::)  
GC: 4ND HOW DO W3 KNOW TH4T 1T 1S 1ND33D WH4T YOU PURPORT 1T TO B3?  
TC: LOOKS legit FROM over HERE sis  
TC: i ALL up AND been TO some OF these PLACES  
TC: MAP has THEM here, ALL shit MOTHERFUCKING present AND correct  
AG: Soooooooo?  
AG: What do you s8?  
TA: thank2 for the help  
TA: now go and diie alone and unloved 2omewhere  
[TA] banned [AG] from responding to memo

Sollux leaned back from his keyboard and exhaled slowly. Holy fuck. He ignored as the others on the board argued and squabbled, trying to winnow down the locations. Instead he looked at his bedroom window, stars shining beyond. It was so late it was early, and he was tired. Tired of being helpless, tired of being useless, tired of doing nothing while people he cared about were hurt.

He glanced back at the screen, long enough to see that the others had agreed on a few likely locations. He leaned over to type a few more lines.

TA: iim goiing two fiind hiim

He got up from his chair and walked to the window, pushing it open and climbing onto the sill. The hordes of protesters gave him pause, but at this hour they were quiet, sleeping like the rest of the world. They would wake up when he passed them, but Sollux couldn't let that stop him. Karkat was not going to die because his best friend sat home and did nothing.

The frown slipped from the psionic's face as he stepped out into the open air, blue and red energy crackling around him and keeping him aloft. He turned his face towards the city and pushed, accelerating through the air in a way that he hadn't dared to try for two years. He had sworn he was never going to fly like this again, but despite the exhaustion and the pain and the crushing weight of responsibility part of him had loved being the Helmsman. There was nothing quite like flying. Without the machines and the engines and the mechanics of the ship, he couldn't go faster than light- but he wasn't exactly slow, either. He could check every location on that list by dawn. Flaring like a firework, colors blurring to purple lightning, Sollux Captor raced through the skies of Los Angeles to find his friend.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Q: What? Two chapters in one update? What is this MADNESS?
> 
> A: I have a week off and if I post two chapters this update and two next update then I will finish! Also I wanted to get this damnable pesterlog and its coding out of the way.
> 
> Yup, that's right folks- the next update will be the last one for this story! More in the notes then.
> 
> Also, Zack Condon commented on chapter 20: "It was... Spade Slicks Twin Brother Jack Noir DUN DUN DUN!". Congratulations! You didn't get the names right, but I would say that's still a bloody good guess. :)


	23. ==> Be The Heroic Bucktoothed Prankster

### CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO ==> Be The Heroic Bucktoothed Prankster

John Egbert peered out from behind a pile of dusty sacks, then jerked his head back when he saw the Ringmaster's back scant feet away from their hiding place. He turned back to Jade and pointed to the near edge of the air-conditioner maze. She nodded and looped Karkat's arm around her shoulders, leading and dragging the limp troll across the three yards of unshielded space. John followed, eyes tracking to be sure their pursuer didn't turn. Miraculously they made it, dropping to rest against the cold metal, safe from the methodical search for a few more minutes.

“Can we make it back to the stairs?” Jade whispered. John peeked around the edge of the unit, although he already knew the answer.

“Too much open space. He'd see us for sure.” He nodded towards the troll who was slumped limply against her shoulder. “How's he doing?”

Jade narrowed her lips. “Badly. I'm not even sure he's really conscious any more.”

John chewed thoughtfully on his lip. They couldn't have been on the roof more than ten minutes, ducking and dodging and hiding from the monster that was chasing them, but it felt more like hours. Days, even. His head was spinning; he wanted to jump off the roof and ride the breeze, wanted to hold onto Jade and just vanish and reappear somewhere safe. He wanted to be home with Dad. He wanted to curl up and cry. But Jade and Karkat needed him, so John forced the panic and the fear down and asked himself the same question he'd been turning over and over in his head since they had started their escape.

 _What would Nic Cage do?_ Trapped on a roof with his half-blind sister and an injured comrade, at the mercy of an armed and dangerous villain. It was exactly like the climax of a movie, one that John would watch with a whole banquet of junk food and fizzy pop, grinning the whole way through and waving his arms in excitement at the best parts. Taking a deep breath, he closed his eyes and ignored the images that flooded his imagination, near futures where Karkat was dead, where he and Jade were prisoners, where nobody ever came to save them and their bodies were never found...

How does this movie end?

Since they hadn't contacted anyone, John was pretty sure no helicopters were turning up at the last second. He had to be the hero; somehow it was up to him to beat the Ringmaster in a climactic showdown. John bit his lip as he tried to focus on how he'd been able to kick the man down the stairs, and not on how his stomach was flipping over and demanding that he actually think about this completely insane plan. Nobody was coming to save them and Jade was helping Karkat. There wasn't anyone else.

“Hey, look after him,” he whispered to Jade, before leaning over to give her a swift peck on the cheek. She looked puzzled, but he was moving before she could grab him, and then what could she do? Shouting after him would draw the Ringmaster, and she had to keep pressure on Karkat's side. John slipped away into the shadows of the maze and followed the twists around until he was fairly sure he could emerge without giving away where his friends were hiding. He looked out from behind a hollow, curved vent and saw the dark silhouette of their pursuer against the glowing orange of the skyline. He was holding the teddy bear and the bunny in one long-fingered hand, and a wicked blade as long as his forearm in the other.

For a moment John's heart fluttered. There was a nightmare pushing at the edges of his thoughts; vague flashes of blood, the sound of someone howling in broken despair while a second voice laughed coldly, and a deep sense of terror and loss. Something about this man brought it out of him, drew the horrors from his mind like nothing and nobody else. But Jade and Karkat were counting on him, so he shook the pervasive fear the only way he could.

The person who stepped out into the open was not John Egbert, frightened teenager. He was Cameron Poe, ex-con with a heart of gold. He was John McClane, weary police officer having one hell of a Christmas. He was Martin Riggs, bereaved and manic detective with a job to do. He was a hundred muscular heroes in wifebeaters with deep emotional motivations, fighting their way through the forces of crime and chaos to the ultimate showdown, rescuing their loved ones in a courageous and manly fashion and never, ever, being too terrified to move or even think.

The Villain seemed to sense him and turned, their eyes meeting across the rooftop. The Hero stood, waiting calmly, imagining that the breeze ruffled his hair slightly in the light of the predawn. Slowly the Villain started towards him, a lurching walk that favored his left side. As he drew close to the Hero, he came to a stop, and dazedly he held out the hand that clutched the two soft toys. The Hero regarded him solemnly, and the Villain scowled.

“It's yours, baby bear,” he said. “Got it for you. Kept it safe.” He shook the toys emphatically.

The Hero watched him warily, knowing that at any moment the madman could attack. He had to be ready. “I'm a little old for stuffed toys,” he said, keeping his eyes steely even as he noted that it was a good line. Cage himself would have been proud of it.

The Villain stared at him blankly, then to the Hero's horror he saw tears rolling down the man's pale, dirty cheeks. That wasn't in the script, and he faltered. The Hero mask slipped and John stared, terrified, at the serial murderer who was apparently crying because he wouldn't take a teddy bear.

“I... I'm sorry,” John said, and gently he reached out and took the bear, catching the rabbit too as it fell. “They're brilliant, honest they are, best present ever.” He was babbling, he knew he was babbling, but something in the Ringmaster's face lit up as he saw John cuddling the toys.

“I got one for you both,” he said. “Bella said. It's not fair otherwise.”

“Right,” said John, and then froze because behind the Ringmaster, sneaking across the rooftop towards the staircase door, he could see Jade. She was half carrying, half dragging Karkat with her, casting occasional furtive glances over at her brother and his adversary as she went. John must have been staring himself, because the Ringmaster frowned and shifted as if he was about to turn. Suddenly it occurred to John that all the Ringmaster had to do was look back and Jade and Karkat were caught. In panic he did the first thing that came into his head and threw the two soft toys on the ground.

“I don't want them!” he yelled. That got the Ringmaster's attention, all right.

“What?” he growled, taking a step closer. John swallowed but stood his ground.

“I don't want them!” he repeated, a little less certainly this time. “Because, uh, I'm fifteen! And cuddly toys are dumb! And you're dumb too!”

It was hardly a masterpiece of taunting, but there was no denying it was effective. With a yell the Ringmaster leapt, knocking John to the floor and holding him down with the long knife to his throat. It was the twin of the one the cops had, black and curved at the tip, sharp enough to easily slice flesh. John went very, very still.

The Ringmaster was crying again, tears running down to fall onto John's face as he gently brushed the flat of the blade against his captive's cheek. Something about the weeping made everything worse, the fear that was starting to choke John's breathing feeling almost like a betrayal, which was ridiculous because he was being pinned on a rooftop by an armed homicidal maniac and none of this was his fault!

“She got you,” the Ringmaster was saying. “She got you and put her light in you, all the poison, and it's all my fault, I was late, I was late. Forgive me, baby bear, please...”

John couldn't say anything, breath frozen inside him as the dark blade raised, the point directly above his heart. He wondered dimly how bad it would hurt to die.

Then something- someone- barreled into the Ringmaster from the side, knocking him off John. The human boy got to his knees to see Karkat struggling to keep the lunatic pinned, two pairs of hands desperately scrambling across the rough surface of the roof for the blade. Jade came running up beside him and grabbed John's elbow, helping him back to his feet.

“He woke up when you started yelling,” she said, gasping for breath. “I didn't even know he could move that fast!”

John remembered the small troll diving across the countertop in the Strider apartment, almost as swift as Dave, and thought that maybe he should be flattered. Then he saw the thick red fluid coating Jade's hands and remembered that Karkat was still badly injured. Fighting was the last thing he should be doing; John had to help him!

“Come on!” he yelled, running to where the pair were struggling and grabbing one of the Ringmaster's flailing arms. It was the only thing he was sure he could reach in the middle of the thrashing tangle of limbs and claws, but as soon as he had it John realized that the Ringmaster had more mangrit than he could hope to summon. Just as Jade reached the fray he was knocked backwards, flying into the side of a nearby air-conditioner with a clang that resounded through the building. That was all the opening the killer needed; before Jade could grab him, he had an arm around Karkat's neck, blade pricking just under the troll's chin. All of them froze, a tableau of violence stilled which was broken only by the ragged heaving of Karkat's chest and the low growl of the Ringmaster, a black and white caricature in the purple light of the night. John felt his heart sink, leaving a gaping and hungry void in his chest. This was it. He'd failed. Karkat was going to die and probably he was, too, and Jade was going to be left all alone with this madman. He stared at his sister in mute apology, tears welling up, before his brain caught up with his eyes and he realized that something didn't fit here.

Since when was the light _purple_?

John turned his head at the same time the others looked up, jaw dropping as he saw the thin figure that floated in the air just past the edge of the roof. The troll looked to be his own age, with way too many teeth for his mouth and two pairs of dorky little horns. He would have looked harmlessly nerdy- if he hadn't been crackling all over with two-tone lightning, eyes flashing blue and red as he hovered above them. For a dizzying moment John wondered if this was what it felt like when the X-Men showed up to rescue you, but then the Ringmaster looked up at the floating troll and roughly tugged Karkat closer. The newcomer hissed and flared, but pulled back slightly. John looked over at Jade, who carefully mouthed the word _Sollux_.

Rose had said a lot about her adoptive brother in the past. Antisocial, bad-tempered, rude, computer genius, powerful psychic. John wasn't sure why or how he was there, but looking at the situation and how Sollux was acting there was one thing he could figure out for himself. The sort of raw power that could push a spaceship between stars for three years didn't necessarily mean the sort of fine control that could separate a maniac with a knife from his hostage, and Sollux wasn't willing to risk killing Karkat in an attempt to free him. But in the psychic's hand, half-hidden behind him at an angle the Ringmaster wouldn't be able to make out, John could see the backlit screen of a cellphone. He tilted his head and listened; from the streets below, he could hear the sound of sirens, and realized another reason for the psionic's apparent patience- he had found them, and the police were already on their way.

They weren't out of danger yet, but John felt hope come flooding back as he realized all he had to do was stall for time. Slowly he got to his feet, head spinning, and held out his hands in supplication. “Okay, look,” he said, licking his lips as his mouth went inexplicably dry. “Maybe there's something we can do. Let's talk about this.”

The Ringmaster snarled at him. “Liar! I can hear you talking through him, you bitch. Stealing my precious boy again!” His hand twitched and Karkat inhaled sharply as the blade drew a faint trickle of blood. Neon light flared from above then died back again, an epilepsy-inducing strobe flash of psionic power.

“Well, what about me?” asked Jade, glancing rapidly from John to the Ringmaster and back again. “Will you listen to me? Brave bunny?”

The Ringmaster's expression changed, became a gentle smile as he focused on Jade. “Always,” he muttered. “Always listen to you, my beautiful, my darling. Always keep you safe.”

Jade hesitantly took a couple of steps forward and stooped to pick up the rabbit, discarded on the rooftop. She gently brushed the dust off it and smiled.

“You know, it kind of reminds me of one I had when I was little,” she said brightly, hugging the rabbit close.

The Ringmaster nodded. “Yes, yes! You had a bunny then. You loved the bunny, I remember, you loved him and you cried so much when he was taken away.” He watched her with eyes that shone darkly. “That's why we got you another one. Bella said. She said you loved your bunny.”

“I did love my bunny,” Jade agreed, edging closer. “I loved him so much.” She bit her lip nervously, and glanced between John and Karkat. “I love my friends, too,” she said tentatively. “So I know you've got plans, and I don't want to upset you, but I'd really really like it if you could let Karkat go, and let all of us leave...”

The Ringmaster roared, and Jade jumped back as he surged to his feet, almost cutting Karkat again in the sudden motion. “NO!” he screamed. “You have to stay here! Where you're safe! Where I can protect you from HER!”

There was a loud clatter as the door to the stairwell burst open, and Detectives Sikes and Francisco charged onto the roof, each of them training guns on the Ringmaster and coming to a halt on either side of Jade as they saw the hostage. John saw them exchange a glance, and then Detective Francisco took a step forwards.

“Noir,” he said softly. “Noir, you have to come with us now.”

“NO!” the Ringmaster yelled. “I only just found them! You can't take them away again! You can't take them! I'm going to make us safe!”

“I understand,” Francisco said soothingly, edging forwards another step. “But you have to know that this won't end well. Let us take that boy to the hospital and we'll try and help you.”

The Ringmaster growled. “Nobody helps me,” he snarled. “Jack won't listen, Bella can't do anything. She's everywhere and I have to keep them safe because nobody else will!”

“I know,” Francisco agreed. “I have kids myself, and I would do anything for them. Anything. But this isn't the right way.” He closed in another step and reached out a hand. “We just want what's best for you and your children.”

Children. Somehow hearing it like that, coming from the Detective, made it suddenly and horribly real. John swallowed and tried to fight back the knot of panic in his stomach- _Luke, I am your father!_ It was a classic, really, the villain being the hero's father... and he was the son of the the Ringmaster, the murderous monster that wanted to kill him and his friends, and that wasn't a story or a game, that was a real thing that was actually happening and more than anything John felt _angry._

“HEY!” he yelled, crouching up with one hand on the dented air-conditioner behind him, not caring as all eyes swung around to face him. “GET AWAY FROM THEM, YOU FUCKING DOUCHE!” His other hand, scrabbling on the rooftop, wrapped around a bit of loose concrete. John grabbed it, surged to his feet, and hurled it at the Ringmaster in one single thoughtless motion.

The chipped, artificial rock bounced off the serial killer's shoulder and landed on the floor with a clatter. The Ringmaster took it about as well as he had taken the earlier rejection of his gift.

“BACK OFF!” the madman yelled, and Detective Francisco hastily retreated as the killer clutched his hostage closer still. Karkat's eyes were drooping, and John guiltily wondered how much blood the troll had lost by now. Brilliant psionic lightning crackled impotently as they all watched the Ringmaster, waiting as he muttered and twitched and growled to himself. John started to scan the rooftops, looking for silhouettes against the sky that was beginning to pale with the first hints of dawn. He was hoping for police snipers. What he saw was something quite different.

Three shapes darted across from the roof next door, three tall and lanky forms that merged with the shadows and shifted from one place to the next seemingly without touching the intervening space. John tried to follow them but his eyes couldn't keep up, and he lost all track of them until a pale arm reached out from behind the air vent and brushed his elbow. He glanced back and saw a familiar pair of dark aviators under a mop of blond hair, Dave Strider giving him a small nod as he laid a single finger across his lips. John hastily looked back at the hostage scene, but couldn't stop himself from glancing around to try and spot Bro and- who was the third guy, anyway?

Then as Detective Francisco tried to take a step forward, the Ringmaster nicked Karkat's face again, and John found out exactly who the third guy was. Gamzee dropped from the scaffolding and he wasn't an avenging angel, he was a howling demon, wild black hair a halo of darkness and the baseball bat in one clawed hand a sword of vengeance. The troll grabbed the Ringmaster's weapon arm before the human killer could even twitch, but didn't get the chance to follow through on the strike as the madman swung his forehead into his assailant's face. Indigo blood poured from Gamzee's nose and a scream of rage and pain and blind fury echoed across the rooftops as the troll fought to keep a grip on the arm that threatened his moirail. For a long, frozen moment the pair grappled for supremacy, two pairs of bright, mad eyes staring into each other, clear green meeting burning indigo, teeth gritted in silent effort.

Then Karkat bit the Ringmaster in the arm, sharp fangs sinking through battered cloth to draw blood, and as the human yelped and loosened his grip the small mutant troll slipped down, falling unconscious to the floor. No longer burdened by the need to protect him, Gamzee went on the attack, a blur of gray and purple and black that was somehow met and matched by the dustier darkness of the Ringmaster. There was a splintering thunk as the human killer's blade struck the troll's bat, and moments later the uselessly locked weapons were discarded as the pair went at each other with fists and knees and teeth and claws. Gamzee laid a deep scratch across the Ringmaster's face that narrowly missed his eye; in return, the human bit viciously down on the young troll's shoulder, refusing to let go even as Gamzee beat him mercilessly in the head. They hissed and howled and snarled and John couldn't tell from watching which one was making what noise.

Then two human blurs of motion appeared behind the Ringmaster, blond and stony-faced and cool as ever. Bro didn't even hesitate, just reached into the deadly melee of teeth and claws and fury and grabbed the Ringmaster. With Dave's help he grappled the serial killer, the Strider brothers holding the Ringmaster still as the man bucked and screamed and howled for freedom. John jumped upright to run towards them- then paused. Because even though the bad guy was caught, even though he was struggling helplessly in the Striders' implacable grip, Gamzee had bent down to retrieve both weapons and pull them apart, glaring at the Ringmaster like he was about to attack the man and anyone who got between them. John glanced down at Karkat, but the indigo-blood's moirail wasn't moving. He looked nearly dead.

Gamzee hissed and stepped closer to the captured Ringmaster, who stilled and returned his malign stare. Gamzee's eyes narrowed and he snarled as he tightened his grip on both bat and blade. John, nearer to the two detectives, saw Sikes raise his gun and take aim at the young troll, saw him open his mouth to shout a warning.

Then Gamzee opened his hands, and let the weapons fall. He stepped back, rubbing his palms on his T-shirt, and dropped to kneel beside Karkat. Taking that as a cue the Strider brothers started dragging their captive towards the detectives. As they produced handcuffs and started to read the man his rights, John scrambled over to where Gamzee was brushing hair out of Karkat's pale face.

“Come on, bro,” he was saying, purple tears leaving tracks down his gray face. “Wake up. I just got my rescue on to come and motherfucking save you, so now you gotta wake up and be all yelling at me or some shit.”

John looked down at Karkat. He wasn't sure he could even see the troll's chest moving any more. He felt a hand rest on his shoulder and looked up to see Jade; beside her, Sollux's feet were just touching down on the roof, psionic glow fading away as he leaned over Karkat.

“KK?” he asked urgently. “Oh fuck, we need an ambulanthe.”

Gamzee gently shook Karkat's shoulder. “You'd be so motherfucking proud of me, palebro,” he whispered. “I all had my angry on and all the harshwhimsy screaming in my thinkpan and I didn't motherfucking listen, so you've gotta wake up so I can tell you all the bitchtits control and shit I got now.” He frowned, biting his lip and absently licking up some of the purple blood that dripped from his nose. “Please, bro. Please. Wake up. Always and forever, that's what we up and fucking promised, so you've gotta motherfucking wake the fuck up.” John felt himself starting to shake as Gamzee leaned over and gave Karkat a chaste, loving kiss on the lips. It was like in fairy tales, when the prince wakes up the sleeping princess, except the prince and princess were both blood-soaked trolls and the magic of true love wasn't going to do a thing to help.

“HEY! PARAMEDIC, THITHEADTH!” Sollux was yelling, arms waving at the steady stream of people who were pouring onto the roof, and John wanted to see who they were but the edges of his vision were going kind of fuzzy. The last thing he saw before passing out was Gamzee, muttering and crying, lying down to settle his head against Karkat's still shoulder as the bright orange light of a new dawn rose in the sky behind them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> :O
> 
> Oh no! Karkles!
> 
> ==>
> 
> EDIT 18/12/2012  
> More fanart happened! Whoo!
> 
> It can be found on the other end of this [elegant and finely crafted link](http://fc01.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/353/b/6/you__d_be_so_proud_of_me____by_watchowl-d5ohngk.png), courtesy of [Watchowl](http://watchowl.deviantart.com/) [(Tumblr)](http://luciddreamerash.tumblr.com/).


	24. ==> Be The Loving Fatherly Chap

### EPILOGUE ==> Be The Loving Fatherly Chap

When he first walked into the hospital room they didn't notice him, their attention focused firmly on the television set in the corner. The man didn't recognize the show- some sort of daytime news talk affair, the sort of thing he might watch if he wasn't usually at work when it was broadcast- but the key players in the debate were familiar. On one side wearing matching Purist Movement badges were a round, motherly sort of woman and a stern middle-aged man whose bald pate shone in the studio lights. On the other side sat a tall blonde woman, elegant and relaxed and, he thought, extraordinarily beautiful. Beside her was a teenager who was clearly her daughter, and an Alternian girl of the same age adorned with a discreet tiara.

“... don't understand how you can be demanding any kind of sympathy for a race who are proven to be killers from childhood,” the Purist woman was saying. The man rather thought that there was something poisonous about her tone, sickly sweet and almond tasting. “They are undeniably dangerous and no human parent wants them living near their children!”

The man frowned from the doorway as a smattering of applause in the studio greeted the pronouncement. As a parent himself, he thought her words were taking something of a liberty with his own opinions on the subject. The others in the room didn't think much of her argument either, if the string of vehement Alternian from the short, nubby-horned boy in the nearer of the two hospital beds was any indication. He waved his arms angrily and stabbed an emphatic finger at the screen, heedless of the IV that trailed perilously from his wrist. Next to him a tall and gangly Alternian with high, curving horns and a thick clown mask of white face-paint was idly tangling his fingers in the shorter boy's hair and laughing softly. On the other side, between the two beds, a third Alternian with bicolored glasses and twinned horns ignored them both to glower at the television.

On the show, Feferi Peixes leaned forwards and smiled at the two Purists, carefully not showing the sharp fangs that filled her mouth. “Have you ever read a story entitled, 'Lord of the Flies'?” she asked earnestly. “It was recommended to me as a famous piece of literature on this world, which I should read to try and understand humans better. I can't say I exactly enjoyed the tale, but on some level I found it reassuring- it made me see that we aren't all that different, and that with the right environment and influences we become better people. I think that's true for all of us, and I know that if we work together we can make this a better world for everybody!”

The Purist man was frowning, not least because the young Alternian girl had raised a louder round of applause than his colleague. “You cannot seriously be suggesting that human children are capable of the kind of violence you yourself admitted that a significant proportion of trolls have committed. Why, the physical advantages your race possesses alone...”

Rose coughed gently. “If I might remind you, Mr Blake, of the recent Ringmaster killings where a human man was solely responsible for the bloody slaughter of numerous _Alternians_ , including several with cool chroma. I think we can agree that any alleged physical advantages are irrelevant to the argument of whose species is the most deadly. And as far as violence in human children is concerned, studies have shown...”

“Who the nookchafing fuck are you?”

The man looked around from the television screen to see the gray-skinned boy in the hospital bed glaring at him. The tall clown-faced boy beside him was also staring, and had shifted slightly, putting himself between the injured Alternian and the newcomer. The third boy just glanced in his direction, then turned his attention back to the television. The man decided that it was probably best to ignore a little bad language in favor of a friendly introduction, and politely raised his hat.

“I'm Mr Egbert,” he said, smiling. “John's father. And you must be Karkat and Gamzee- my son has been talking about you nonstop since I got here.”

Karkat pulled a disgruntled face. “Wonderful. As if I didn't have enough bulgebrained morons called Egbert to deal with already.” He gestured down to his side, where a thick bandage was just visible through his hospital gown. “In case it slipped your notice, today is the first time in weeks I can be described as anything even resembling fully fucking conscious. Because, as it happens, modern medical technology can do fuck all for massive blood loss when your blood is both alien to this world and a fucking unique miracle color, a description of my nearly fatal mutation which you can attribute to my rot-panned assclown of a moirail here.”

Beside him, the tall Alternian that Egbert had reasoned to be Gamzee gave a little wave. “Nice to be meeting you, motherfucker,” he said cheerfully. Karkat reached out and slapped him.

“Don't fucking encourage him,” he snapped. “The last thing I want on my first day of actual waking recovery is some human fuckwad hanging around being a pain in my ass.”

Egbert couldn't help wincing at the language. John had mentioned in passing that the pair both had a bit of a mouth, and he'd thought that talking to the Strider brothers would have prepared him, but using words like motherfucker as a polite greeting... then again, it wasn't as if either of them had ever had someone to teach them differently. More worrying was the standoffish attitude- it seemed as if they probably wouldn't be interested in what he had to say. Not that it meant he shouldn't make the attempt anyway. Egbert had never backed down from the right course out of fear that he might be rejected and he wasn't about to start now.

“I was just wondering if I could have a brief word with you boys,” he said. “Alone,” he added, casting a glance at Sollux, who stared back then sighed heavily. He and Egbert had met before, on previous visits to the hospital, and as the psionic Alternian grabbed his cellphone and started for the door the human spared a glance for the still figure on the second bed, her face as peaceful as if she were merely sleeping.

“How is she?” he asked, and Sollux paused to look back at Aradia, face unreadable.

“Doing better,” he said. “RX thayth there'th more brain activity, and it'th looking pretty hopeful, but even if it workth at thith rate it'll be monthth or maybe even yearth before thee waketh up.”

Egbert smiled. “I'm glad to hear that she's improving,” he said. Sollux nodded in reply before scooting out of the room, leaving him alone with Karkat and Gamzee. The two remaining conscious Alternians examined him suspiciously as he walked around Karkat's bed to take up the seat Sollux had so recently vacated.

“I've been waiting a while to speak to you both together,” Egbert began, leaning forwards and twining his fingers together as he spoke. “First of all, I wanted to thank you both for your part in rescuing my son. I've heard his story and although I am extremely proud of him, I am also immensely grateful for everything you two have done.”

Karkat shifted uncomfortably in the bed, but Gamzee beamed. “Thanks, man,” he said. “John's been all up and talking about you some, too, and you sound like a motherfucking bitchtits lusus!”

Egbert smiled a little uncertainly. “Yes. Well. On that front. It is my understanding that your last experience with the child protection service was less than ideal. I have discussed it with John, and we were rather hoping that, well, we could make your next home somewhat more welcoming.”

There was a moment filled only by a loud advert for a diet drink on the TV, then Karkat leaned forwards, large eyes narrowing.

“Are you offering to foster us?” he asked suspiciously.

Egbert took a deep breath. “For the moment. In the long run, if it works out, offering to adopt you. If you're willing.”

If anything, Karkat's glare grew even more suspicious. “You know Sollux asked us to come live with him and Rose?”

“Did he?” Egbert could feel his heart sinking a little.

“Yeah. And Sollux lives in a fucking mansion. Several fucking mansions.”

“Ah,” Egbert supplied. He probably shouldn't have been so hopeful to begin with, but truth be told he had got rather attached to the idea of expanding his little family. And John would be so disappointed. On the bed opposite, Karkat folded his arms.

“So. You give me one reason why I should come and live with you and your irritating offspring in what I can only presume is a far inferior human dwelling, when I could be living in the lap of fucking luxury with my rich and famous best friend.” Gamzee made a disappointed noise, and Karkat's glare briefly flickered in his direction. “Best _non-quadranted_ friend, you utter nookchafing moron. Did you get fucking greasepaint fumes in your cartilage nub?”

“I... I'm rather afraid I can't see why you should,” Egbert admitted. Karkat continued to glare at him, and Gamzee's happy smile was anything but helpful. He should leave now, let the boys be happy living with their friend in what he had to concede were far better circumstances than he could offer them. But there hadn't been an outright refusal yet, and there was no way he could face John unless he saw this through to the end. Egbert sighed heavily. “Nonetheless, the offer still stands.”

The short boy in the bed said something in Alternian to his moirail, sparking a brief conversation between the two in the harsh alien tongue. Before Egbert could think what they might need to discuss, Karkat had turned back and, still scowling, said: “Okay.”

Confused, Egbert shook his head. “I beg your pardon?”

“I said okay, fuckass,” Karkat snarled. “As in yes, you can take us home with you. Don't make me regret this decision already, I'd like to save that until at least the point where we see what sort of a shithole you live in.”

“It's quite a nice house, actually,” Egbert said, dazedly. “If you don't mind my asking, why?”

“Because Solbro was wicked nice to offer and all,” Gamzee said absently, staring transfixed at the artsy perfume advert that had appeared on the television screen. “But he wouldn't have up and said it if we weren't all needing someplace. You motherfucking want us, for real.”

“And if we get fucking sick of the sight of you, Sollux'll probably take us anyway,” Karkat added. “Assuming my thinkpan doesn't completely snap under the weight of the famed Egbertian musclebeast shit first, of course.”

Egbert's face split into a wide grin. “Well, that's fantastic!” he exclaimed. “And John will be delighted!”

Karkat rolled his eyes. “Look, I don't know what you think this is going to be like, but I want to make this clear right now. I am seven sweeps old, I've spent most of my life looking after myself, and I come with an attached unresolved court case. Gamzee's pretty much the same, except minus the criminal charges and plus some extra fucking shithive crazy. Neither of us is a nice little wriggler you can mold and shape into an Egbert junior, and if you try I am going to flip my shit all over your ridiculous hat, got it?”

Egbert held a hand up to his fedora and chuckled. “Now, boys, I know you're new to the family, but as far as ground rules go a good start is to never, ever mock a gentleman's hat!” He smiled and settled back in the chair. “And I understand that this isn't going to be easy. But I'm willing to work at it if you are.”

Slowly, hesitantly, Karkat nodded. He lifted his non-IV attached arm and held it out stiffly to Egbert, who carefully took the hand and shook it. Then Gamzee hooted and gleefully clambered over the bed for a hug, prompting panicked roars from Karkat as he tried to maneuver his tube out of the way and protect his stomach from wayward knees.

For a moment as Gamzee scrambled over his cursing moirail, Egbert wondered what exactly he was getting himself into. But then, as he looked up, he saw Sollux peering in at them through the window in the door. The psionic gave him a slow wink then walked off again, and Egbert realized something important. When he had adopted John, he hadn't wondered for a moment where the child had been born, or what his past had been. He had just held his new son in his arms and known that from that moment on, he was never letting him go. And now, receiving an awkward bony hug from an alien boy that smelled of greasepaint and, oddly enough, mint, half-listening to a foreign tirade from another alien boy with mutant blood and what was evidently a foul temper, he had that same warm feeling again. A sense of belonging, of safety, of beginning something truly and deeply important.

Egbert smiled gladly, and with no regrets he welcomed his two new children into his heart.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> THE END, MOTHERFUCKERS.
> 
> Holy shit this has been fun. SO MUCH FUN. So much so, that I'm totally gonna write more stories in this here AU. But, since I'm going to be sure to finish writing them before I start posting, that will take a while, so I have two relevant announcements.
> 
> 1 - I cannot think of a decent name for this AU. I can probably default to something nonsense if I have to, but since I have time to ask... any ideas?
> 
> 2 - Since I don't want to just stop posting, and since back when I wrote before I used to have two projects running at once, I will be starting SOMETHING COMPLETELY DIFFERENT to run with while I'm writing more of this! The other fic will be of the I write a chapter/I post a chapter variety, and will most definitely take user suggestions for plot. It really is going to be very different to this, so I don't know how many of you will like it, but I thought I'd mention it anyway just so you know I'm not dropping off the face of the planet.
> 
> Oh, and although I didn't find a good place to write it here, the Midnight Crew TOTALLY busted out of jail and are on the loose again. The cops should probably have searched Clubs Deuce more carefully... aw, who am I kidding, they did, it just didn't stop the Crew. ;)


End file.
